A Still More Excellent Way // How to Get Over Yourself and Live a Life That Counts, Part 7

A Different Perspective Official Podcast

There are so many gifted and talented people on this earth. Take you and me – we both have gifts and abilities that other people don’t have. But there’s something else. something more that we need, to make those gifts and talents count for something.

The biggest problem with other people is that they seem to be everywhere in this world. You just can't get away from them. And so often they drive us crazy because, well, they're just different. They see things differently, they move at a different pace to us, they have different priorities, they go in different directions. You know what I'm talking about, right?

And many, many people find that so annoying, it drives them so crazy that relationships – important relationships, like husband and wife relationships, parent child relationships, manager employee relationships – end up deeply in the red, bankrupt.

That's why there are some people in our lives where it's like there's a brick wall between us and them and it seems as though it could never be any different. For instance, the closeness and understanding and intimacy that was once there in a marriage is gone and it seems as though it can never come back.

But it can because there is a way of doing it. There is a way of getting it back. There is a way and it's a way the Apostle Paul calls, "The still more excellent way". Today on the program we're going to chat about that. This 'still more excellent way'.

The thing that so often drives us nuts about other people is that they're different. Funny how differences can be annoying. I move quickly, you move slowly. You're more gentle, you're more compassionate but I'm not. You love to have fun, I love to study and think things through. You're able to think through and fix a practical problem, I'm hopeless at that.

This list of differences is endless. And just because you can't do the things I can do and I can't do the things that you can do, we can end up annoying one another. Instead of rejoicing in the fact that we each bring a different and complimentary skill set to the table, we end up getting annoyed with one another because you can't do it the way I do it and I can't do it the way you would do it.

When we look at it this way you realise how dumb that is, the way we carry on. But so many people live their lives that way even though it's dumb. In fact it's so common and so dumb that God makes sure that there's almost a whole chapter in the Bible about this very thing. It's 1 Corinthians chapter 12.

That's exactly what the Apostle Paul is saying when he paints this picture that together we're a body. Even though we're all different, we're all part of that one body. We look different. We behave differently. And we have different functions and purposes and skills and abilities but we're all meant to be part of that one body. Have another listen to this, 1 Corinthians chapter 12, beginning at verse 14:

Indeed the body doesn't consist of just one member but of many. If the foot would say, 'because I'm not a hand I don't belong to the body', does that make it any less part of the body? And if the ear said, ‘I’m not an eye so I don't belong to the body', that wouldn't make it any less part of the body now would it?

If the whole body were an eye where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is God’s arranged the members in the body, each one of them as He chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be?

As it is there are many members yet one body. The eye can't say to the hand, 'I don't need you'. Nor again the head to the feet, 'I don't need you'.

See here's the problem, stated so clearly, we're all bickering at one another because we're different. So what's the answer? Well Paul finishes this chapter off with some rhetorical questions and a teaser that takes us on to the answer. He says:

Are all of us Apostles? Are all of us Prophets? Are all of us teachers? Do all of us work miracles? Do all of us possess gifts of healing? Do we all speak in tongues? Do all interpret?

To which the answer is, “No, obviously not”. And then he says:

But strive for the greater gifts and I will show you a still more excellent way.

Okay, so what is this more excellent way that he's talking about? What is it? How do we finally get over ourselves and start living a life that really counts? Well Paul comes straight off the back of this teaser with the answer. The very next chapter, chapter 13, and he shows us this more excellent way. 1 Corinthians chapter 13, beginning at verse 1. He says:

If I were to speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels but didn't have love, I'm just a noisy gong or a clanging symbol. If I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and have all knowledge. If I have all faith so as to remove mountains but I don't have love, then I'm nothing. If I give away all my possessions and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but I don't have love then I gain nothing.

Paul's saying it don't matter how clever, how talented, how wealthy you are, unless you live out who you are in love, in genuine love, it doesn't mean diddly squat. But how do we live out our lives in genuine love? What does love look like? Well Paul goes on to tell us. He says:

Love is patient, its kind. It's not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It doesn't insist on it's own way. It's not irritable or resentful. It doesn't rejoice in wrong doing but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. And now there are faith, hope and love, these three but the greatest of these is love.

You know something, as we let those words sink in, all our arrogance and self importance just melts away, doesn't it? All of a sudden we realise, man, this person who's been driving me nuts, look at what they're capable of. Look at how truly wonderful they are. If I can just get over myself and stop carrying on like a pork chop then all that will open up to me.

Sure, they'll still annoy me sometimes but that's okay. I don't have to win anymore. I don't have to come out on top. They don't have to be like me. I don't have to be the one who gets my way so I can tell other people about it. And the love that God's put in my heart, it bears all things.

You know what, I really can believe the best of them. I really can bring out the best in them. Do you get that? Isn't this so much better than the old way? Isn't this so much better than the hand saying to the foot, "I don't need you?" Isn't this so much better than whinging and complaining about people just because they're different to us.

And when they do that thing that really annoys us, we can smile to ourselves and know that we can cope with it and love them through it. Because when we let Gods Word have sway in our hearts, we just end up doing some serious growing up.

Our life only counts when it counts in the hearts and the lives of other people. And we can only make a difference in their hearts when we accept them and love them and honour them and cherish them just the way they are.

And then, when that happens, something really strange comes out of that. Something really weird goes on. All of a sudden God sets us free to be who God made us to be. Right there, in the middle of the body, we can do the thing that we were made to do.

If we're an eye, we can see. If we're a nose, we can do the smelling. If we're a foot then we can make the body walk. If we're an ear then we can do the hearing. All of a sudden we're free to be who God made us to be. John chapter 12, verse 22 says this:

Very truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a single grain. But if it dies, it bears much fruit.

When we start valuing these people around us, over and above ourselves, when we die to self all of a sudden we start bearing fruit. It's only when we finally get over ourselves that we can live a life that truly counts.