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We're continuing today, this 
Sunday and then next Sunday 

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we're actually going to go back 
and pick up the theme that we 

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missed on the 14th. 
And Paisley's going to be 

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singing for us next Sunday. 
And I didn't, I really didn't 

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want to miss her singing. 
So we just shifted that theme to

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next Sunday and then we will 
wrap up next Sunday. 

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We'll be wrapping up our Wicked 
for Christmas theme this year. 

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So the question we're asking 
today, which I'm sure you have 

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guessed already, is what is this
feeling? 

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One of the songs early on and 
wicked is, is the song What is 

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this feeling? 
Elena and Aaron are going to be 

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up and singing that for us in a 
few minutes. 

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But Emma, what did I say? 
Aaron, No, that's your mom. 

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It's Emma that sing. 
I did it again. 

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My brain. 
It's tough. 

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I've had way too much sugar this
past week. 

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So I might have put your mom's 
name on the slide then, too. 

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Let's see. 
I did. 

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I'm sorry you don't feel too bad
because it originally said Aaron

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and Leah were singing. 
So again, way too much sugar. 

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Sorry, Emma, I actually know. 
My I don't know. 

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My brain does that. 
I'll fix it. 

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I'll fix it right here. 
Oh, and I thought the Christmas 

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card thing was a problem. 
My goodness, the feeling you're 

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feeling now is just best be 
described as that. 

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But what is this feeling? 
It's a good question to ask when

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we have feelings. 
It's a good question to ask, 

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what is this feeling? 
And I want to talk a little bit 

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about feelings and emotion. 
And I want to say first of all, 

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in general, that what is this 
feeling? 

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When we're asked that question 
to ask what our feelings, Why do

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we have feelings? 
What's the purpose of feelings? 

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We can't answer all of that this
morning. 

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I'm not a psychologist, I'm not 
a psychiatrist. 

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They can give you much more 
detailed answers as to the 

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biological functions and reality
of emotions. 

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But I want to just say this 
about feelings, about our 

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emotions. 
Our feelings are an excellent 

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gauge of what is going on inside
of us, and our feelings are a 

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horrible measure of external 
reality. 

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Our feelings tell us nothing 
meaningful about external 

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reality. 
They tell us many and 

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significantly meaningful things 
about our internal reality. 

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For example, friend of mine from
years and years and years ago 

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back when we lived in Tiffin, 
I'm going to call him Bob. 

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His name is not Bob. 
I'm not sure that he would mind 

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if I used his real name, but I 
don't know. 

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But anyway, Bob was it. 
What's that? 

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It wasn't Aaron either. 
So I'm just going with 

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pseudonyms all across the board 
today. 

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Thank you very much, Bob. 
I appreciate that. 

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Now my other friend Bob Bob and 
Tiffin Bob. 

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Great guy, about 6 feet 7 inches
tall, maybe on the high end of 

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6-7, maybe closer to 6-8. 
Not a like a big beefy guy, but 

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fit and muscular white dude 
covered in tattoos. 

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And Bob used to say to me, 
almost with tears in his eyes. 

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I don't understand it. 
I walked down the street and 

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like the other day, I stopped. 
I was waiting at an intersection

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to cross the road and little old
lady pulled up in her car to 

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stop at the intersection and she
looked up at me and then rolled 

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up her window like she was 
afraid of me. 

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Two answers to that one is what?
Yeah, you look scary. 

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Didn't say that to him, but he 
does. 

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He looks scary. 
But the simple fact is, is Bob 

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is one of the kindest, most 
compassionate, most gentle 

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people I know. 
Bob would not hurt a family. 

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There might be some exceptions. 
You go after his wife and kids. 

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You don't want to be on the 
receiving end of Bob. 

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All right, but but just in 
general human interaction, one 

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of the kindest, gentlest people 
I have ever known and deeply 

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distressed that little old 
ladies would roll up their car 

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window because he looks scary. 
People will cross the street and

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walk on the other side if they 
see me coming at night. 

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Like, yes they do. 
How can this surprise you? 

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Those feelings are 
understandable. 

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Those feelings, when people have
them, we can say, well, yeah, I 

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get that. 
But those feelings were a awful 

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measure of the actual external 
reality. 

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No one was in danger. 
Those little old ladies were in 

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no danger of Bob at all. 
None at all. 

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But that's how emotions work. 
Emotions tell us wonderfully 

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important information about our 
interior life and almost nothing

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useful about our external 
reality. 

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Elphaba and Glenda found this 
out as Aaron, Not Aaron, Emma 

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and Leah. 
Whoop. 

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I'm just. 
I'm doing it on purpose now. 

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Trying to dig myself out of this
hole. 

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Wait a second. 
Hold on. 

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Hold on. 
Right here. 

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Whoops. 
Escape. 

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End up deleting the whole thing.
No, no, no, no, no. 

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Now it's messed off my messed up
my formatting, so I got to fix 

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that. 
No, I did the wrong one. 

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Go stop, stop. 
OK, let's do this. 

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Why are you doing this? 
OK, we're going to leave it 

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there. 
Never mind. 

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Come on up. 
Which one of you is which one of

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you is Glenda and which one of 
you is Alphaba? 

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Your Alphaba. 
Hence the green and the pink. 

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OK, so Alphaba and Glenda, you 
can turn around and face them. 

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We're not singing just quite 
yet, but this song sung at the 

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beginning. 
Alpha and Glenda grew up 

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separately. 
They didn't know each other till

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they got to college. 
And they were assigned to be 

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roommates. 
And. 

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And when they were roommates, 
they had an initial very strong 

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reaction to each other that the 
strength of it, I think, may 

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have surprised each of them. 
And Emma and Elena are going to 

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sing about that right now. 
All right. 

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Are you ready? 
OK. 

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All right. 
Here we go. 

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At this point in the sermon, we 
listen to Emma Taylor and Elena 

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Buckley singing. 
What is this feeling from the 

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movie Wicked? 
Emma and Elena did a great job 

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with it, but due to technical 
limitations, I was not able to 

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get a good recording of them 
singing. 

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You can find the Ariana Grande 
Cynthia Revo version on YouTube 

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and all major music platforms 
though, and I hope you'll listen

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to it. 
It's a fun song about two young 

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women who, upon first 
impressions, loathed each other.

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Now back to the sermon. 
Glenda and Alphaba hated each 

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other at first. 
They later became deeply loving,

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fast friends who had a powerful 
and significant and meaningfully

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positive impact on each other's 
lives. 

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But at first they hated each 
other. 

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Their initial feeling was 
loathing. 

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And by the way, group testing, 
focus grouping, and 

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crowdsourcing on this kind of 
information also is not always 

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helpful. 
I think crowd can get it wrong 

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too. 
And the focus groups can get it 

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wrong too, when they're looking 
at their feelings to try to 

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measure external reality. 
This was the issue that was 

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happening with Jesus and the 
Samaritans when Jesus was 

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traveling through Samaria. 
They wanted to stop in a village

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and the village, just because 
Jesus was Jewish, said, oh, 

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yuck. 
We don't feel like having him 

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around here. 
We don't like them. 

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We don't like the feeling was 
immediate and it was rejecting 

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Jesus. 
And when Jesus was rejected, his

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disciples were all like, Oh 
yeah, well, let's just have God 

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kill them. 
It's a little escalating a 

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little too fast, I think there, 
But that was the response, 100% 

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emotional response. 
I feel like that person is bad. 

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I feel like those people are bad
and, and all Jesus could do was 

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shake his head, rebuke his 
disciples and move on. 

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Because Jesus understood what 
Glinda and Alpha became to 

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understand that our feelings 
don't really tell us about 

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another person. 
Our feelings don't tell us about

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another group. 
Our feelings tell us about 

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what's going on inside of us and
if we really want to know 

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another person, if we really 
want to know another group, we 

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need to move past our feelings, 
work through those feelings. 

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Elphaba and Glinda, they worked 
through them. 

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They moved past the initial 
feelings and became close 

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friends, and they gave us an 
example of God's way of relating

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to people. 
They learned what Jesus already 

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knew, that our feelings. 
They can tell us. 

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They can tell us the reality of 
our biases. 

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They can tell us the reality of 
our fears, the reality of our 

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expectations, the reality of our
hopes, and the reality of our 

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dreams. 
But they cannot tell us the 

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reality of the other person. 
And to really get to that, we 

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need to do our relating the way 
Jesus did his relating, not on 

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the basis of emotions. 
God's way of relating to people 

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is different. 
God's way of relating to people 

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is to look at people's hearts. 
And when I say heart, I mean, 

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that's a biblical thing. 
We hear that, that I put that 

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Scripture in there. 
Yeah. 

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First Samuel, this is this is 
God talking about David. 

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The Lord does not look at look 
at the things people look at. 

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People look at the outward 
appearance, but the Lord looks 

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at the heart. 
This is a discussion about David

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and God choosing David to be the
next king of Israel. 

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When other people looked at 
David, their feeling was he. 

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There's no chance. 
He's the youngest of like a 

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bunch of sons. 
There's a whole lot of people in

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line and ahead of him and his 
own family and he's not 

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important. 
He's a shepherd. 

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He's he's good for taking care 
of sheep. 

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When he came out and and Goliath
was there confronting the armies

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of Israel, including the king of
Israel, and David said I'll 

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fight him, I can take him. 
And people like they were like, 

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yeah, no, there's no chance. 
There's no chance. 

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Saul's feeling was the David 
would get to slaughtered by 

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Goliath and then later when 
David killed Goliath and David 

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became very popular and very 
successful and people loved him 

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a lot and we're celebrating him 
a lot. 

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And he proved himself to be a 
very capable soldier and leader.

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Then King Saul was afraid of 
David. 

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First he he felt contempt for 
David. 

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Now he feels fear toward David 
because he was afraid David was 

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going to try to take his place 
as king and overthrow his 

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Kingdom and disenfranchise his 
children. 

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His fear had nothing to do with 
reality. 

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But when God looked at David, he
looked at David's heart. 

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And again, this is not sappy, 
romantic kind of heart. 

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This is not, well, let's see how
David feels about things and if 

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his feelings are the kind of 
feelings we it wasn't that at 

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all. 
The heart in ancient culture, 

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the heart was the word used when
we were describing the the a 

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person's true being. 
Heart encompassed their 

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intellect, their thoughts, their
character, their emotions, their

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spiritual life, everything that 
makes us us apart from physical 

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appearance, our character, our 
faith, our intellect, all of 

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those things were in the heart. 
And God says that's what I look 

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at. 
I don't look at who's the 

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tallest. 
I don't look at who's the 

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strongest. 
I don't look at who's who's, you

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know, the, the most talented. 
I don't look at who's the most 

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popular. 
I look at a person's heart. 

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And that's how I know who that 
person is and what that person 

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is and is not capable of by 
looking at their heart. 

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That's what Elphaba. 
It took a while, but Elphaba and

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Glinda eventually got past the 
superficial, got past their 

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feelings and saw each other for 
who they really were, saw each 

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other's hearts. 
And that made all of the 

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difference. 
And by the way, that whole 

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emotion thing, it can work on 
the flip side too. 

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Alphaba and Glenda both looked 
at the wizard and at the 

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Wizards, You know, right hand 
person, Madam Morable. 

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And their first emotional 
response was, they're wonderful,

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they're amazing. 
We really want to get to know 

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them. 
They're the best. 

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Until they got to know them and 
solve their hearts and realize 

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their emotions had been wrong 
about them too. 

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A poor evaluator and descriptor 
of them as well. 

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Jesus calls us to relate to 
people in God's way, by getting 

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to know people, groups of 
people, individuals of people. 

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Not based on our initial 
emotional responses to them, but

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based on their heart, on who 
they are, on how they relate, on

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what their character is on, on 
how their mind actually 

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functions on work, on what their
attitudes and intentions really 

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mean about them. 
And when we get to know people 

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that way, we still don't have 
permission to judge and stand in

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condemnation over them. 
But now we at least know whether

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is this person a safe person or 
not a safe person? 

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Is this person that I want to 
invest a lot of time and energy 

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and relationship with or not 
someone? 

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Is this someone who is going to 
help me draw closer to God or 

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someone that's going to pull me 
further away from God? 

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Those are the things we know 
when we get to know people. 

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God's way would really get to 
know people's hearts. 

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Jesus met that woman at the 
well, and she did what is so 

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easy for us human beings to do. 
Her response to Jesus was 

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initially largely an emotional 
response based on generations of

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cultural conditioning and the 
culture she had grown up in, 

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based on probably some personal 
experience along the way of what

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men are like, what other how 
other people treat me, and 

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particularly how Jewish men will
treat me. 

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And she saw Jesus and Jesus 
spoke to her and she's like, EW,

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this is gross. 
He's Jewish and he's a man. 

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And he's talking to me in 
public. 

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And her reaction was one of 
resistance and hostility and and

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maybe even a little anger. 
What are you doing talking to 

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me? 
I'm a woman. 

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You're a Jewish man. 
Stop. 

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Stop. 
Jesus's response is telling. 

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If you knew. 
If you knew the gift of God, if 

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you knew who it is that asks you
for a drink, you would have 

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asked him and he would have 
given you living water. 

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He's issuing this woman an 
invitation to not look at him on

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the superficials, to not let her
emotions guide her response to 

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someone who is religiously and 
ethnically different from her 

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and has a different gender than 
her. 

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To look and know him and see who
he is. 

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And if she will do that, then 
she will see that he is someone 

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who is safe in the sense that he
will love her and care for her 

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and guard her and protect her. 
There's a lot of ways Jesus 

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isn't safe. 
Jesus calls us to all sorts of 

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changes of heart and changes of 
mind and changes of behavior 

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that can feel and be at times 
very risky and threaten many 

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things in our lives. 
But Jesus himself is not a 

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threat in that way. 
Jesus is a source of life, and 

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we can only see that when we get
to know him. 

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And that's what Jesus invited 
her to, and that's what he 

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showed her. 
Jesus has a gift that we don't 

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have. 
Jesus can look at a person and 

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know their hearts. 
He probably could have done it 

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with his eyes closed. 
You know, He's Jesus we don't 

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get to. 
We don't have that about it. 

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We have to work at this. 
But but Jesus saw past what all 

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of her, her neighbors and 
associates and people in her 

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00:17:21,079 --> 00:17:27,319
village knew about her, Her, 
her, her sketchy past, her 

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00:17:27,319 --> 00:17:31,640
questionable relationships, her,
her, her, her status and 

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society. 
Which was the reason why she was

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going at the middle of the day 
to go to the well, because 

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everyone else had already come 
and gone and she didn't want to 

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have to deal with the people. 
She went there because she 

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00:17:42,360 --> 00:17:48,880
thought she would be by herself.
But Jesus, Jesus was never, 

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00:17:50,120 --> 00:17:54,400
never seduced by judging her or 
anyone else based on crowd 

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00:17:54,400 --> 00:17:56,840
responses or emotional 
reactions. 

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00:17:56,840 --> 00:18:01,160
He saw her heart. 
He took the time to know her, 

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00:18:01,880 --> 00:18:04,680
and He invited her to do the 
same toward Him. 

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This is the invitation that we 
have. 

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This is the hope and the 
possibility that we have that 

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00:18:13,520 --> 00:18:18,000
we, as followers of Jesus, 
created in the image of God, can

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00:18:18,000 --> 00:18:22,600
live and relate to people the 
way Jesus lived and related to 

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00:18:22,600 --> 00:18:28,640
people not driven by our initial
emotional responses. 

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00:18:28,800 --> 00:18:31,560
No matter the color of their 
skin, no matter their political 

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00:18:31,560 --> 00:18:34,360
persuasion, no matter their 
nationality, no matter their 

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00:18:34,360 --> 00:18:37,280
ethnicity, no matter their 
gender, no matter what group 

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00:18:37,280 --> 00:18:39,600
they do or don't belong to, we 
can. 

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00:18:39,720 --> 00:18:46,040
We can get past our initial gut 
reactions, our initial emotional

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00:18:46,040 --> 00:18:48,720
responses, and know people's 
hearts. 

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00:18:50,760 --> 00:18:54,480
It takes work for us to do that,
but it's the work. 

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00:18:54,480 --> 00:18:58,000
It's one of the works that that 
Jesus is especially interested 

307
00:18:58,240 --> 00:19:02,720
in helping us with. 
He's especially because that's 

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00:19:02,720 --> 00:19:07,080
the work that he calls us to do,
to love and relate to people 

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00:19:07,240 --> 00:19:12,280
that way. 
So what is this feeling? 

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00:19:12,680 --> 00:19:15,880
Whatever feeling you're having, 
I can tell you that feeling is a

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00:19:15,880 --> 00:19:18,200
great measure of what's going on
inside of you. 

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00:19:19,000 --> 00:19:21,600
It can tell you your some of 
your strengths and some of your 

313
00:19:21,600 --> 00:19:24,640
weaknesses. 
It can tell you what you feel 

314
00:19:24,640 --> 00:19:27,160
threatened by and what you don't
feel threatened by. 

315
00:19:27,160 --> 00:19:30,320
It can tell you what makes you 
happy and what doesn't make you 

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00:19:30,320 --> 00:19:31,760
happy. 
What makes you sad. 

317
00:19:32,160 --> 00:19:36,760
Can tell you all of those things
and that that information is 

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00:19:36,760 --> 00:19:41,000
incredibly important. 
But it will never tell you the 

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00:19:41,000 --> 00:19:44,600
truth about the person sitting 
next to you, or across you from 

320
00:19:44,600 --> 00:19:48,720
you, or across the room, or 
across town or across the state 

321
00:19:48,720 --> 00:19:54,920
or across the world. 
To know about that person we 

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00:19:54,920 --> 00:19:56,360
need to get to know their 
hearts. 

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00:19:57,360 --> 00:20:00,320
And to really get to know their 
hearts, we need the guidance and

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00:20:00,320 --> 00:20:02,200
direction and the help of the 
Holy Spirit. 

325
00:20:04,160 --> 00:20:07,520
Thank God we have it in Jesus 
name, Amen. 

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00:20:07,960 --> 00:20:08,400
Amen.