Most of us like some sort of game, board games, outdoor games, actual competition, competing with yourself. If you just love solitaire, solitaire is actually competition with yourself, right? Or against the deck of cards. But anyway, whether we're actually participating in competition or watching competition, we are watching other people compete. We all love some sort of game, some sort of competition. You actually may have been inspired to pick up a game or start a sport when you were young or maybe even not so young by watching somebody else play. And they made it look so easy because professionals make everything look so easy.
And then you got out there and you were, we'll just say that you were over-inspired. You were so inspired, you went out and now you have, you call it a sports injury. It's not actually a sports injury, you hurt yourself getting out of the car to go try this or learn this new thing. But all of us have been so inspired by people who are so good at something and it may not even be a physical, a sport that requires physical agility, maybe an online game or online gaming or some sort of game. But we all love watching competition and most of us at some level love to compete.
Years ago I got invited to go visit a church in South Carolina to do some training for their staff, and it was a large church, so during the week, and so we had two morning sessions and then they said after a lunch, our staff, we have an annual dodgeball tournament.
And I noticed that during the sessions, all the staff, it was pretty big staff, they all had on jerseys, like different color. There were four different teams. I'm like, wow, this is like a serious thing. So after lunch I was going to head home, but I thought I got to see this. So we walk out to this outdoor dodgeball tournament area they'd set up and everybody had on a jersey, even the pastor, but the only person who didn't was the pastor's wife and she was on staff. And so we're walking out with a group and I said, "So you're not really into dodgeball?" And literally the whole group stopped and the pastor looked at his wife and then she looked at me and she said, "They don't allow me to play." I'm like, "What?" And the pastor said, "She's too competitive." I'm like, "I bet there's some stories there."
So anyway, you may be that person, you're super competitive. But anyway, for the most part, we enjoy watching other people compete and at some level there's probably some gaming going on and some sort of competition that you enjoy as well. But there is one area, or to stay with the sports analogy, there was one arena. There's one arena or one area where competition and games should be off limits because they're harmful, they're toxic. I don't know, lethal may be too strong of a term, but they're just not healthy and they should be avoided at all costs. And that is in the realm or the arena or the area of relationships because relationally speaking, and all of us have experienced this, okay, this isn't new information, all of us have experienced this.
Relationally speaking, a game that requires a loser is a game. Nobody wins. That when it comes to relationships, any kind of challenge, any kind of game we play, we're going to talk about a few in just a bit. Any kind of competition that's relationally driven is a game that requires a loser and a game that requires a loser ultimately, relationally is a game that nobody wins, everybody loses. And let me illustrate it in the arena that we've experienced the most, if you just think about home for a minute, we're going to talk about whether it's your roommate or at work or in the neighborhood, but home is where we experience this first. Have you ever won an argument at home? Now you've had arguments at home, growing up with your parents or maybe with you, if you have kids now or again with a roommate or fiance or husband or wife, you've had arguments within the context of home, but have you ever won an argument at home?
And if you think, oh yeah, I've won some arguments. Next question. What exactly did you win? What was the prize? Congratulations. You sleep on the couch, you won, okay, you beat him, you beat her, you trounced, you won. Now you're going to have to leave. Congratulations, you powered up and now your son hates you or at least he says he does. You won the argument. Everybody agrees you won and now your son says he hates you or congratulations, that last zinger left your daughter speechless and in tears. So take a victory lap around the island in the kitchen. I mean, when it comes to relational arguments, that kind of competition that we're going to talk about, there really, even if you think you won, you out-argued, convinced your roommate, they're going to never do or start, there's something that happens to the relationship that's always negative.
Again, at the end of an argument relationally, do you shake hands like good game? No. Do you hug and high five? Good game mom. Good game, mom. No. Let's go another round, dad. No, you don't say these. Best two out of three, honey, you want to go again? You go first this time. No, but trying to take the competition, the sports analogy, even the sports language into the context of a relationship, especially a relationship with somebody that's a long-term relationship, family relationship, it just doesn't work. But there is a tendency for all of us, me included, to bring that level of unhealthy competition and challenge and win-lose into relationships at work and the community and especially at home. And again, you may get your way because you out-argued or out-convinced. You may get your way, but you lose something along the way. And here's why that's the case, and this is kind of the driving principle and I want to set it up as a question, don't answer out loud, just think for a minute.
When it comes to relationships, what's the win? I mean, what's the win in a relationship? And the answer is the relationship. That's the win. The win is a mutually satisfying, mutually enjoyable relationship. There's not an individual win. If there's an individual win and an individual loss, it's just a loss because relationally speaking, if somebody loses, it's a loss for the relationship. The win in your most important relationships is in fact the relationship, mutually satisfying, mutually enjoyable, mutually beneficial. So real quick, I want to go through a list of games that all of us have probably seen played out somewhere in some relationship. Unfortunately, this is a list of games that maybe you're going to identify yourself in this. This is a list of games where today for the next few minutes, I don't want you to identify the person next to you, so no elbows and side-eye and groans and don't laugh a little bit too loud so you to make sure they hear you, okay.
This is about you evaluating whether or not you and whether or not we are guilty of bringing unhealthy competition or a sense of competitiveness into a relationship where it doesn't belong, that results in a winner and a loser, which means everybody loses. So I'll start with some of the most familiar relationship games. There's the change game where I'm going to figure out how to change you without you knowing that I'm changing you because I think you need to be changed, right? Actually, I'm trying to fix you, but I didn't want to put the word fix up here because you got into the relationship and this person has some issues. In fact, you married them with issues or you're engaged to them with their issues, but you're convinced you are going to be able to change them without them knowing it, which is foolish because they know just like you would know, right?
Then there's the guessing game. This is one I'm very guilty of. Sandra and I have been married 36 years, and so I've figured this out finally but early on in our marriage, I was so guilty of this. The guessing game goes like this. I'm not going to tell you what's wrong, you have to guess. And we're going to go through at least three rounds of, what's wrong? Nothing. What's wrong? Nothing. What's wrong? Nothing. We got to go three rounds of that, and then I'm going to say, "Well, if I have to tell you it's because you don't really care." But you got to guess. All right? And I'm never going to tell you this is the guessing game. It is so unhealthy. And the thing that helped me get over this quick is Sandra refused to play, which was exactly the right response to my moping around and trying to get her to figure out why I was so sad.
She's like, "You deal with it." And finally, I quit the guessing game. Anyway, moving on. There's the guilt game. You know the guilt game, the guilt game goes like this. So I guess you're just going to leave that there, right? Instead of addressing the issue, I guess you're just going to leave it there. So I guess I'll just go by myself again, right? The guilt game. People don't treat me that way at work. People don't talk to me that way at work. Then there's the blame game. We've all played the blame game. We basically, nothing that I do is really my fault because it's all in response to you. The reason I'm the way I am is because of you, and if you would change, I would be able to change. This isn't really my fault.
And then there's next level blame game. The next level blame game is the passive-aggressive version. It is so powerful. It's so powerful, it's so horrible, but it's so powerful because the passive-aggressive version of the blame game allows you to apologize, which makes you look good, but you're apologizing in a way that actually blames them. So you look good because you're apologizing and there's a blame stuck in. Okay, this is professional level gameplay. It goes something like this. It goes like this. Hey, I'm really, really sorry that I reacted the way I did when you got home an hour late again from the gym. So see, I get credit for apologizing. I want to apologize for blowing up when you, when you, when you, next level, very passive-aggressive, great for relationships. Then there's the comparison game. We've all accidentally dipped into this or gotten pulled into this.
The comparison game is did you notice the way he? Did you notice the way she? Did you notice the way they? Similar to the comparison game, is the shame game, very similar. The shame game goes something like this. If my dad were here, he would be able to fix that with a piece of duct tape. So it's like you should, in other words, the shame game is you should be up for this or you should be able to do this, or you should be mature enough. The shame game, I'm going to try to shame you into changing,
Now, if you've ever been on the receiving end of the shame game, the comparison game, any of those games, you know internally what it does to you and what it does between you and the person that's playing this game with you, and when you're the one who has initiated these games, the same thing is happening on the inside of the other person.
But we get tripped into these things and pulled into these things so quickly. And for some of us today, these are habits. These are habits. The other, a couple more, these last two are awful, the family of origin game. You know how this sounds? You're just like your, who. You're just like your father. You're just like your mother. You know what? If your mom hadn't, you probably wouldn't. If your dad would have, you probably would. And suddenly you're trapped and now they've ganged up on your whole family and you don't really have any defense because you know they're right. But listen, here's the thing. Even if they're right, you don't go, "Oh, I'm fine now. I'm so glad you brought that up. I feel like I'm making progress. I think this is a go-to thing for you. I feel developed as a person. I feel..." No, that's the problem with these games.
Even when the person that you're dealing with is correct, it doesn't do anything for the relationship, and none of these games motivate us to be better people. Last one is the motive assignment game. This is, very few people are able to do this well, motive assignment is basically I can read your mind, and since I can read your mind, I can tell you the motive behind what you're doing. And even if you don't know why you're doing it, I know why you're doing it. Because I can see into your soul. If you weren't so selfish, if you weren't so concerned about what everybody else thinks. Hey, I know what's going on here. You just don't want to go, do you? You just don't want to do it. I am going to assign a motive to your behavior. And again, even if I'm correct, what happens to the relationship?
I'm trying to win, make you lose, and at the end of the day, we both lose because there's no win-lose in healthy relationships. However, if you're competitive and you love games and you would like to make the relationships that you're in, that you appreciate, games, whether it's relationships with someone you love, someone you know, someone you work with, someone you live with, if you really want to bring competition to a relationship, there is one game that comes highly, highly recommended.
It works with family, it works at work, it works in the community. In fact, it would work in our nation if everybody decided to play. These are for players five years and up, five years old and up. One to 10 players. Actually, you can play this game alone, but the more people that play, the more fun it is and the better that it is. And this game was actually introduced to us at least, maybe longer ago than this, but this game was at least introduced to us 2,000 years ago by the Apostle Paul. The Apostle Paul, as many of you know, wrote about half the New Testament. He was a first century Jesus follower. He was a Pharisee before he became a Jesus follower. He hated the Christians. He tried to shut down the church, and then he met Jesus and his life changed. And he brought to us, and this is so important to understand, if you just started reading the Bible or maybe just started reading the Bible again.
The Apostle Paul took the teachings of Jesus and he contextualized them and explained them for non-Jewish people because he went to the non-Jewish world to explain that God had done something in the world for the world by sending his son into the world. So in his letters, he teases out how to follow Jesus as a non-Jewish person, even though he was a Pharisee and he was a Jewish person because he was like an evangelist to the non-Judeans and the non-Galileans of his day. So he writes several letters, and one of these massive letters goes to Christians living in first century Rome. And this is where he introduces this game, and I call it, and I think we can all agree to call it, the honor game. The honor game. Now it's like the Hunger Games, except it's completely different. So it's not anything like the Hunger Games, it's the honor game. And in the honor game, and this is why it's so exciting, in the honor game, you actually win by losing, because you can play it by yourself.
But if multiple people play it, if the people in your office began to play it, if the people in our community began to play it, if the people in your family began to play it, even if just two people in your family began to play it, when two or more people play, everybody wins. Here's how he describes it, writing to Christians in first century Rome. He says this. He says, "I want you to be devoted to one another in love." He writes this. "Be devoted to one another in love." And he pauses and he thinks, okay, that's kind of soft. It's kind of squishy. What can I say that will appeal to the competitive nature of these Jesus followers living in highly competitive Rome?
So he creates a unique but compelling phrase, and here's what he dictates to be written next. He says, "Get," and I'm going to give you the Greek version because it's very gritty. The English version is a little less gritty because it softened it. But here's sort of the literal translation of what he says. He says, "Giving honor, one another, going before." Bad grammar for us but this had a point, this made a point. Giving honor, I want you to be devoted to one another and here's what it looks like. I want you to give honor, one another, going before, and here's his point. It's so powerful, he's saying, instead of be first, I want you to go first to put the other first. Instead of trying to be first, I want you to go first. I want you to win the competition. I want you to be the very first to put another person first. I want you to out honor one another.
I want you to win the competition of how quickly can you show honor to another person before they show honor to you and make it a game. Compete to be the first to put others first. Here's what an English translation says. Again, it takes a little bit of the grit out. He writes, "Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another." There's our word. "Honor one another above yourself." And here's the question, what does that mean? What does that look like? What does it mean to honor another person above yourself? Here's what it means. It means that this is a choice. He's saying, I want you to choose. It's always a choice. I want you to choose to treat other people. I want you to choose to treat the people around you as if they deserve more honor than you do. Well, do they?
Paul would say, that's not the point. I'm not saying they do deserve it. I'm saying I want you to choose. It's a daily choice. I want you to choose to honor the people around you as if they actually literally deserve more honor than you do. It's a choice. He writes another letter or dictation another letter to Christians living in Philippi, and he kind of doubles down on this idea. Here's how he says it there. He says, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit." I mean, if we just embrace this for a month, the world would change. But he says, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit." And then here's our big idea. "Rather," he says, "in humility," here, it's again, says it a different way, "value others above yourself." In other words, regard one another as more important than yourself. Again, here's the word, consider them of greater value than you carry. Consider them and treat them as if they are worth more than you. Not because they are, it's irrelevant. This is a choice he's encouraging us to make. Treat them as if they are.
And here's what I know about you. Most of us have never met, most of us have never met, those of you watching online from all over the place. But here's what I know about you. You know how to do this. You don't need a lesson in how to do it. You just need to decide whether or not you're going to do it. And here's how I know that you know how to do what Paul is telling us to do. Have you ever met someone more important than you? Now if you say no, ah, yeah, that's another sermon for another day. But I think most of us average people would go, "Oh yeah, I met a president of a company. I met a world-famous author. I got an autograph from somebody I respect." So all of us would say, okay, when it comes to human, just human culture and the world around us, yeah, you've met some people where you weren't sure what to say and you got an autograph or you just got close to them, or you took a secret picture.
But we all know how we feel and we all know how we behave when we meet or we are around somebody that we hold in high esteem. And here's my question for you. In those moments, even if you didn't have a conversation, but you were just around them, how did you treat them? And I know the answer to the question. You treated them or responded to them like they were more important than you. That we know how to do this. You got this. You didn't interrupt. You didn't correct. If they said something they thought was funny, you laughed, right? You didn't sit if they stood you, this is a word we don't use much. You deferred to them. You honored them. You know how to do this.
What if you just did that with everybody? This is Paul's point. He's like, look, I want you to treat, I want you to honor people as if they actually deserve more honor than you do. I want you to do that for everybody, not just the famous bodies. Back to Paul, again, here's what he said.
"Honor one another above yourselves." That is treat or value other people as if they're actually more valuable than you are. And here's the thing, you can play this game everywhere you go with everybody you meet. Imagine that. If your approach to people at work, at home, your kids, your spouse, your roommates, it was just, you know what? I'm going to out honor everybody. I'm going to win the honor game every single day with every single person I meet. That doesn't mean you don't have hard conversations. That doesn't mean you don't address things that need to be addressed. It means that you never dishonor anyone. Because if you're a Jesus follower in particular, you are invited and commanded to actually honor people or treat them as if they have more value than you. Now, here's the pushback, and I get this.
If you're thinking, okay, but Andy, okay, but look, that's cute and funny and everything, but look, Andy, come on. Nobody is actually more than me. And nobody's actually more important or has more value. That's the word that the Apostle Paul uses. Nobody actually has more value than any other person. We're all made equal. We're all made equal in the sight of God, or we're all citizens, or whatever your worldview is. And let's just say for argument's sake, you're right. That's not the point. The Apostle Paul is saying, I'm not saying they have more value. I want you to treat them as if they do, and then don't tune out. Then he tells us why he would dare say such a thing.
Now, real quick, if you're not a Christian or not a Jesus follower, or you're from a different faith tradition, I'm going to kind of leave you right here with what I've said so far. You should try this at home. You should try this at work. It will make your relationships better. It will make you better at life. This is an extraordinarily powerful principle. But what I'm going to say next and look at next, the Apostle Paul gives us his reason as a Jesus follower as to why all Jesus followers should do this. And what he says next takes all my excuses away not to honor other people above myself. And if you're a Christian or a Jesus follower, it takes all of your excuses away as well.
Here's what he says. He says, "Have this attitude in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus." In other words, since you're a follower of Jesus, I want you to follow and adopt the attitude or the approach, the tone or the posture of Jesus. These are words we use a lot. We want the tone, the posture, and the approach to life and the approach to relationships as Jesus. And he's like, yeah, Paul's like as a follower of Jesus, I want you to have his attitude. And what was his attitude? Paul's about to tell us. He treated people as if they were more important than he was, and they weren't. They literally were not more important than him. He's God in a body, after the crucifixion and the resurrection it's like, after the resurrection, Jewish men and women worshiped him, which was unheard of. You don't worship people.
Even the Romans didn't worship living people. They worship dead people, but nobody worshiped living people. Jewish people, they didn't worship living people. They worshiped Jesus because they realized he's God in a body. He's the word of God who's come to earth. They worshiped him. He's definitely more valuable and more important than they are. And yet in his life, follow him through the gospels. He treated people as if they had as much or more value as he did. Listen to what he says, "Have the same attitude as in yourself as Christ Jesus," who talking about Jesus, "who being in very nature God." He's God and a body. This is amazing. Paul says, "Jesus did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage." He never played the God card. Folks, I'm here. My name's Jesus. I'm God. Okay, so we'd like to sit right over there and if you guys could move, or maybe I'll just move you. Again, I know I shared that. He leveraged his power and his authority for the benefit of other people.
He treated other people as if they were more important than he was, and they weren't. And Paul says, if you're going to follow Jesus, this is what it looks like. This is what the kingdom of God looks like. It's the inverted pyramid. It's not about people on top who are sucking all the life and resources this way. It's about people with life and resources and opportunity. Sharing those life, sharing life and sharing resources and sharing opportunities with people who don't have them as if they were more important than the people who do. He says, this is the kingdom of God and it started with your king. Not only did he not use his power to his own advantage, he says he made himself a nobody. He made himself nothing. And this is the point. This is the game. Jesus chose to treat others as if they were more important than he was, and were they?
No, but he treated them as if they were. And do you know what else he did? This is the gospel. He treated you as if you were more important than him. He treated me as if I was more important than him because he took my sin and he took your sin on himself and died in public as a slave and as a traitor to his nation and the empire, and he wasn't. And if our king did that for us, we lose all of our excuse not to do that for each other. If you're not a Jesus follower, it's optional and it will make your life better. If you're a Jesus follower, we have no excuse not to. He says "He made himself nothing by taking the very nature and the form of a servant." Which means what servants do, they step back. They let you go first.
Servant to who? Servant to you, servant to me. And then Jesus says to me every day, Andy, I want you to follow my example. I want you to play the honor game. I want you to out honor. I want you to out honor everybody. I want you to show more honor to Sandra than she shows to you. I want you to show more honor to the people you work with than the people, than they show to you. I want you to out honor the people in the community. I want you to be aggressively, competitively honoring other people, not to get attention and not to get a pat on the back so that they feel, ready for this? So that they feel the honor that God has bestowed on them as one of his children whom he dearly loves.
In other words, pull up to the table and play the honor game. When everybody plays, everybody wins.
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