Podcasts about audio transcript

  • 24PODCASTS
  • 587EPISODES
  • 49mAVG DURATION
  • ?INFREQUENT EPISODES
  • Jan 1, 2025LATEST

POPULARITY

20172018201920202021202220232024


Best podcasts about audio transcript

Latest podcast episodes about audio transcript

CHINA RISING
China Writers Frans Vandenbosch, Irene Eckert, Jeff J. Brown, Patrice Greanville and Quan Le gather for a 2025 crystal ball discussion. Video, audio, transcript.

CHINA RISING

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 1, 2025 105:28


TRANSLATION MENU: LOOK UPPER RIGHT BELOW THE SOCIAL MEDIA ICONS. IT OFFERS EVERY LANGUAGE AVAILABLE AROUND THE WORLD! ALSO, SOCIAL MEDIA AND PRINT ICONS ARE AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST!   Sixteen years on the streets, living and working with the people of China, Jeff               For donations,...

Mosaic Boston
The Unstoppable Kingdom

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 29, 2023 46:41


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com.Heavenly Father, we thank You that You are God overall, and even over those who don't yet confess Jesus Christ as Lord, You are Lord over them as well. Lord, we thank You for regulating revelation of Your holy truth. By Your Spirit, you're the one that illumines the truth into our hearts, and we pray for more revelation in our church. We pray for more revelation given to us, not just so we can store it, or hold it, or keep it unto ourselves, but so that we can share it with others. As we get light, as we get knowledge and discernment and wisdom, I pray that You give us the unction of the Holy Spirit, the power of the Spirit to then share it with others.As we come to know who You are, let us be a people that wants to testify to the greatness of Your holy name. Lord, You are so holy, even Your name is holy, and we pray that Your name will be hollowed in our church, in our hearts, and our lives, and we pray that Your name will be hollowed and considered holy and revered in the city. Lord, there are many who don't yet follow You, don't yet even believe in You, and we pray for a revival. We pray for an awakening. We do believe that Your kingdom is unstoppable.You promised that there was nothing that is going to remain hidden, You will reveal all truth, and we pray, Lord, use us in the process of this harvest of drawn many to Yourself. Give us a zeal, a burning zeal in our hearts to do everything we possibly can to see people whom we love, come to faith, to receive eternal life, to receive the power of the Holy Spirit, and to receive forgiveness of sins and a relationship with You. Lord, we pray that You instill a hope in us, a hope that is unshakeable so people around us do realize there's something different about these people, they do believe, and they build their life on this hope. And we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen.We're continuing our sermon series to do with the incredible gospel of Mark. We've called it Kingdom Come, the Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom, and the title today is the Unstoppable Kingdom. Question, "What's one thing that grows the more you share it? The more you give it to others, the more you test it, the more you share, what is that one thing that grows?," and I would submit to you, it's your faith. The more you share your faith, the deeper your faith gets.The more you testify to the truth of God, the deeper your understanding of that truth is. Jesus Christ told us, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men. I'll make you compel people to come into the kingdom. I'm saving you as an instrument of salvation for others." That's part of our purpose.1 Peter 3:15 says, "But in your hearts honor Christ, the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect." We should be such hope-filled people, that people around us are like mesmerized by this hope that we have no matter what the circumstances. No matter what the situation in the world, we have an unshakable hope. Why are you a follower of Jesus Christ? Well, it's because the Lord sent someone to you at some point to sow the seeds of God's word into your heart, and the fact that you're following Jesus today is evidence that the seed was planted into fertile soil.The seed goes deep and it germinates, and a root system goes deep into your heart, and that seed grows as it is nourished by the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit bears fruit through us, and the fruit that the Holy Spirit bears has seeds, and that's the seed of God's word, and we are then to take those seeds and we are to sow those seeds into the heart soils of other people. Then, by the power of God, they too are saved. They're saved from God's judgment. They're saved for God's kingdom and His mission, and the intention is clear from these parables that the Lord is giving us today. We are not only to receive knowledge, but do everything we can to impart that knowledge to others, and this is how the kingdom of God grows in your life and in the world.Today, we're in Mark 4:21-34. Would you look at the text with me? "And He said to them, 'Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand? For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest, nor is anything secret except to come to light. If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear.'""And He said to them, 'Pay attention to what you hear, with the measure you use, it will be measured to you, and still more will be added to you. For to the one who has more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.' And He said, 'The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows. He knows not how. The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear, but when the grain is ripe at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.'""And He said, 'With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which when sown on the ground is the smallest of the seeds on the earth, yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.' With many such parables He spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it. He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to His own disciples, He explained everything." This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word.May He write these truths on our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, love the light, hunger for truth, and share the gains, second, sow the seed, trust God for growth, harvest is coming, and third, there's room for all in the kingdom of God. First, love the light, hunger for truth, and share the gains. So Jesus, in the previous text, has interpreted the parable of the sower, and now, He gives us a few more parables, of the lamp, of the hidden in the manifest of having, and not having, and that the kingdom grows like seed.These parables, with their emphasis on revelation and the necessity of paying attention, extends the theme of the word and its hearers. Verse 21, "And He said to them, 'Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand?'" Jesus uses very similar phrasing in the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5:14, Jesus said, "You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.""In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." Now, the text in Matthew 5 is very clear. Don't hide your light. Be good witnesses to Jesus Christ, and this world do good works so people see the good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. It's tempting when you come across a text like ours to say, "Oh, there's a similar phrase that's used in a different text like Matthew 5," and just assume that Jesus means the same thing because He used the same phrase.Jesus, just like us, often uses the same expressions and different context to communicate different truths. So just because Jesus is using the same image, or the same expression, or the same phraseology doesn't automatically mean He's saying the same thing. We have to pay attention to the context. In Matthew 5:15, Jesus is urging us to do something. You shine your light to the world.Here, Jesus is promising us something wonderful. He's not just calling us to action, but He's giving us a promise, and the promise is about the destiny of the kingdom of God. The parable is teaching us that the future for the kingdom of God is bright, and I just want to point out a couple of things from the text. In our translation, the English standard, it just says a light. There's no definite article.The definite article is the. In the original Greek, there is a definite article before the word, lamp, so it's the lamp. A particular lamp is in view, and where the text says that the lamp is brought in, the Greek actually says, "Does the lamp come in?" It isn't brought in, it comes in all on its own. There's a personal agency ascribed to the lamp. Meaning, the lamp is a person.The lamp comes in. The lamp here is the Lord Jesus Christ, and this is what Jesus taught us about His identity in John 8:12. "Again, Jesus spoke to them saying, 'I, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.'" So probably, the best way to read verse 21 in our text is that the lamp is the revelation of God and His kingdom as has come in the person, the words, the works of Jesus Christ.It's a message, a revelation summarized in the message of the gospel. If the lamp is here and the gospel of the kingdom is here, Jesus is saying, "What's the intent?" It's here in order to be exposed. It's here in order to shine. This is what He's telling His disciples.He says, "Be patient. When it looks like the darkness in the world is oppressive, when it looks like there's so much darkness, that no light can penetrate that darkness, be patient. Continue to believe." Even with Christ, many were opposing Him. There was an antagonism that was growing amongst the Scribes and the Pharisees, and partially because they didn't want the light of God in their life.This is a lot of people, they want God's love, but they don't want God's light, but God is Love and He is Light, and you can't have one part of Him without all of Him. Many people love John 3:16, a verse that many have memorized even since Sunday school, but in the context about God loving the world, He does say like the world has rejected this love because they don't want the light, they want to continue living in darkness. Look at John 3:16-21, "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.""And this is the judgment, the light has come into the world and people love the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed, but whoever does what is true comes to the light so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God." He's saying the light has come and the light has come in the form of Jesus Christ, and people reject Him because people loved darkness. This is what the difference between a believer and non-believer. A believer has a brand new heart.You're regenerated. When you repent of your sin, you're given this brand new heart that longs for God's light. You want to love the light. You love standing in the light, living in the light. You love being a child of the Light, and you love God's word because God's word illuminates more of your life. It shows you more of the ways that you are to walk in and the ways that you are not to walk in light that shows the way to live.Psalm 119:105 says, "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path." So even in the short-term, God intends those outside even if He does intend that they misunderstand this word. It's not going to be hidden forever. The truth is here, and even if people suppress that truth, there will come a point where the suppression is no longer even possible. Mark 4:22, Jesus continues, says, "For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest, nor is anything secret except to come to light."He did not come to have His light hidden away, and the whole point of His coming in this veiled form, often rejected form, was so that the light might shine, undim to the ends of the earth. He came in weakness and suffering. He came as a seed to be buried in the ground. Look at Isaiah 53, one of the most powerful, prophetic passages about the person of Christ. "Who has believed what He has heard from us and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?""For He grew up before Him like a young plant and like a root out of dry ground. He had no form or majesty that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by man, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces. He was despised and we esteemed Him not." Just as in the past, nothing was hidden except in order to become manifest, so Jesus is saying this is true.Even now, in the present, all the hiddenness of the current age will ultimately serve the purpose of revelation. This is exactly what happened with the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Jesus, who is God, the Son of God, King of kings, comes and He proclaims the word of the kingdom. "The kingdom is here. Repent and believe. Everyone who repents and believes is welcome."But the opponents of Jesus, they misunderstood His word, and they rejected it. The word didn't penetrate their hearts, it didn't transform them, but this rejection of the word led to Jesus' death, and as a result from the divine perspective, it led to ultimate revelation, more revelation. He was killed by those who refuse to believe His word, refuse to see His identity, but in this divinely will death, which is caused by their spiritual blindness, God ushers in a brand new age of revelation. After Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Jesus now is proclaimed as the Messiah, as the Son of God, and after the Holy Spirit falls on Pentecost. Now, when the message of the gospel was proclaimed, the Holy Spirit takes that message and transforms people.He saves people. The obscurity of the word ultimately serves to lead to greater revelation. The lamp of God's word has come into the room and is casting its light into every crevice for everyone who would welcome the light into their heart. 1 John 2:8-11, "At the same time, it is a new commandment that I'm writing to you, which is true in Him and in you because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining. Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him, there is no cause for stumbling, but whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes." At the same time, we look around the world and we say, "Well, if the light has come and the light is revealing the kingdom of God, why aren't more people Christians? Why aren't more people following the word of God?," and Jesus here says, "There will come a time when everything is revealed, and at that point, it will be too late." The kingdom will not remain hidden forever. It is seemingly hidden now, in that its full power is not evident, it's concealed in some way, but there will be a day when the kingdom is completely revealed because the light of function is to expose the darkness.The kingdom of God, the kingdom of Jesus Christ cannot stay hidden. Nothing can obscure it. No shadow can engulf it or eclipse it. Why are we believers? Because God shown His light into our heart so that the knowledge of the glory of Jesus Christ is understood.The light of the gospel is chasing away the shadows of unbelief, and the people who walked in darkness are beginning to see the light. And what's our job? Our job is to believe this promise, that the kingdom is unstoppable, that the gospel light will continue to shine and God will draw the elect, will draw His children to Himself. And what's our job in the process? We are to love the truth, hunger for the truth, and impart the truth for others. The light isn't just given to us so we enjoy our lives here on earth until we go to heaven.No. We have work to do to testify to Jesus Christ, that He alone is the Doctor of our souls, that He alone is the Way to salvation. There's no other name by which anyone will be saved. That day, the judgment day, or when Christ returns will reveal that to everybody, and for most people, will be too late then. I understand in a place like Boston, it's easy to lose your hope.You look around, you're like, "We are outnumbered. Big league, we are outnumbered. We are on the losing side," and that is a lie of the enemy. As soon as you begin to believe that lie, we lose the power. We are to believe that Jesus' kingdom is growing, will continue to grow, and sometimes it feels like our light just isn't enough.It feels like you're in Fenway Park, all the lights are out, you're by yourself, and you want to light up the night just a little bit. You take out your phone with a little flashlight, and you're like, "Yeah, the light of Jesus," and it looks pathetic, puny, flickering even. It seems like the darkness is absolute impenetrable. You say, "What can my little light do?," and then you realize, "It's not my light. It's not my light, it's not my lamp."The light is Jesus Christ Himself. The light is God. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Do you believe this? Do you believe that there is no one beyond the reach of Jesus Christ? Do you believe that there is no heart so hard, that grace cannot soften it and change it forever?The light will pierce the darkness. We just need to proclaim that Jesus is the Light. He is the only Way of salvation. I'm confident of that because of the promise here, that the light came not to be hidden, it came to blaze forth and to give light to the world, and nothing can stop Jesus Christ. Nothing can stop the King.Last week, I shared that I had a toothache, and thank you for all your condolences. It was supposed to be solved on Tuesday. I woke up the happiest person to get a root canal ever. I even got a shirt, buttoned. I was like, "I'm ready to go."Did my hair. I'm like, "I'm ready to go to the endodontist." I show up, and they say, "Thank you for coming for your consultation." I was like, "What? No."So my dental appointment is on Tuesday. Tuesday is coming. Praise be to God. And so I was at a staff meeting. I came into the staff meeting on Thursday. We were praying for one another, and I shared about my toothpaste, and Raquel was praying for me, and Raquel starts praying, and it's just powerful, and then she's like, "Lord, you see the decay in Pastor Jan's tooth, just decay.""Decay. He's decaying. He's fallen apart. Decay, decay, decay." And that's all I heard.I'm like, "I am ... Yup." I said, "Amen." We are all decaying. I just want to just share that tremendous news. We are all mortal.We are all going to die. Time will be up for each one of us. The Lord knows when that is, but I'm telling you, dear soul, dear eternal soul, that moment will come, and you will stand before Jesus Christ, and you will stand before Him as forgiven, welcome into the presence of God, or He will stand before you like a judge. It's one or the other. This is what Jesus is saying, that the kingdom is inevitable.This is true. This is the greatest truth that there is. This is the truth underneath every single truth, that Jesus Christ is King, and the only way that we can be forgiven of our law-breaking, of our insubordination, of our rebellion against the King, is to fall on our knees and say, "Lord Jesus, please forgive me of all my sins. Lord Jesus, I repent," and Jesus Christ says, "The love of God will be poured into your heart. The light of God will be poured into your mind, and you will be transformed."This has to be real for every believer. When we meet friends who are not Christians, who are not followers of Christ, you need to believe that they are on their way to hell, eternal damnation apart from Jesus Christ, and this is why we proclaim the gospel, this is why we do what we do. This is the truth, and our job is to sow the seed of the gospel, and not to be afraid of it, not to be afraid of speaking the truth. There are proponents of other religions who are 10 times, 100 times more courageous than most Christians today. I watched the UFC.A lot of Muslim fighters are in there, and they're all, "Inshallah," and they're just saying, "Praise be to God. If God wills ..." They're just throwing in God in every ... I'm like, "Imagine if believers did that, just on a daily basis, speaking the name of Christ every opportunity that we get, no matter what cost." Why? Because that's how important it is.In Mark 4:23, He says, "If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear." He's saying that ears to hear this message are a gift from God. Repentance is a gift from God. Faith is a gift from God, but using the ears that God has given us, that's our responsibility. We are to say, "Lord, tune our ears to hear Your voice and give us grace to hear."In verse 24, "And He said to them, 'Pay attention to what you hear, with the measure you use, it will be measured to you and still more will be added to you." The wake-up call is repeated and reinforced, pay attention to what you hear. He's not saying that it's just hearing per se, you hear. No. It's hearing to understand.It's hearing with the commitment to obey no matter what it says. Also, he says, "See what you hear." That's the original. It's the sense of hearing doubled by the sense of sight, suggesting we're going to use all of our faculties to listen to the word of God, and significant in the wording, the call is to pay attention not just to how we hear, but to what we listen to. Be careful in the voices you'll allow into your life and to your heart in a world that is still, in some sense, Satan's house and his dominion.Not all voices who claim to be speaking on behalf of God really are. Many of the voices are deceitful, perhaps even satanic in claiming to be God's word. Later on in Mark 13, Jesus says that, "Satan does everything he can to lead astray if possible, even the elect." So we, as believers need to be careful, careful of the voices we allow. Listening sermons is important.You should listen to sermons, but I want you versed in the scriptures more than you are in sermons so that you can discern, "Is this truly the word of God or not?" On the other hand, when we listen to God's word with the intent to obey, God gives us more revelation, and as He does, He continues to draw us to the calling that He has for us to go and preach the gospel, to receive, and then also share the gains that we have. Romans 10:14, "How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed, and how are they to believe in Him of whom they have never heard? How are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news?,' but they have not all believed the gospel, for Isaiah says, 'Lord, who has believed what He has heard from us?'""So faith comes from hearing and hearing from the word of Christ." In Ephesians 1:13, "In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory." He says, "With the measure you use, it will be measured to you and still more will be added to you." Mark here takes a phrase that was known in ancient literature, a phrase that had to do with giving. If you give to others, whatever you give will return to you, but here, he applies it to epistemology, knowledge of God, in particular.What He's saying is if you receive insight from the Lord, if you receive it with a welcome heart and a pure heart, you will get more insight, and the measure of our engagement with the word, the way we respond, our desire to grasp its message and digest its truth, no matter how hard to chew, will determine the measure of blessing we enjoy from it. Do you want more blessing? Of course we do. He says, "Pay closer attention." The word teaches clearly that if you come close to God, He will come close to you.He will draw near to you. If you take a tiny step toward God, God will more than match the movement. In verse 25, He says, "For to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away." Now, Proverbs 13:4 says, "The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied." Diligence.Are you diligent about your faith? The Christians that I know, that I've seen them grow spiritually by leaps and bounds, and the ones that have grown in spiritual prosperity are those who are diligent, diligent in their study of scripture on a daily basis, diligent over private devotions and private prayer, diligent over attending worship services and community groups, in the same way that exercise and use of muscles are strengthened with exercise so that the soul is strengthened when we exercise the means of grace that God has given us, and we are to expend all energy to listen to the word and the promises that we will be proportionally rewarded. Those who heed the message get more understanding of the message, get more revelation, get more blessing. Those who do not heed the message end up with nothing, and the idea of the rich getting richer applies to truth, that God gives wisdom to the wise, and He gives grace to those who long for insight and knowledge. For example, Daniel 2:19-23, "Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night.""Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. Daniel answered and said, 'Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons. He removes kings and sets up kings. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding.""He reveals deep and hidden things. He knows what is in the darkness and the light dwells with him. To You, O God, of my fathers that give thanks and praise, for You have given me wisdom and might and have now made known to me what we asked of you, for You have made known to us the kings matter." So we are to pay careful attention to how we listen, to what we listen in terms of the word of God, and let the measure of your response to the word be full, and complete, and heartfelt, and diligent, and real, and those who give themselves to the word like this, they gain much. What do you gain when you pay attention to the word?You gain eternal life. You gain a relationship with God. You gain energy and strength to persevere despite trials. You gain comforts that the world cannot even imagine and you gain a hope that no tragedy can touch, and you gain heaven itself. But to those who hear the word and do not respond like this, but respond with tepid indifference, "Oh, yeah, God," "Oh, yeah, God's word," "Oh, yeah, Christ dying on the cross, bleeding, crucifixion," "Oh, yeah, Jan, I've heard that before," well, Jesus says those who listen like that, even what they have will be taken away.So the word of God when proclaimed, no matter how familiar you are with the word, you can't ignore it. What a joy and peace we have in the word. In particular, watch for those texts in holy scripture where you are tempted to plug your ears with your fingers. "No, that's not for me. Yeah, they say that that's God's word, but that's not for me."Pay close attention to those texts. Some of you have been walking with Christ for years, and your relationship with the Lord has just grown cold. There's no obvious rebellion in your life, but it just feels like your faith is like stale bread, left out too long, dry, crusty, and moldy. The word used to come to you like fresh water from a rock in the desert, like manna from heaven, and now you just sit in services or you're reading scripture, and there's just nothing. There's no life, there's no interest.There's just boredom. At these moments, the Lord is speaking to you and say, "Pay attention. Pay attention to what you hear, how you hear because the stakes are that high," and Jesus today invites you to turn away from your lukewarmness and draw near to Him, and ask the, "Lord, send me this hunger. Send me a thirst for Your presence and for Your word, and give me this attentiveness, this desire to hear it no matter what and to obey," and the Lord will meet you there. Second, sow the seed, trust God for growth, and harvest is coming.Mark 4:26-27, "And He said, 'The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows, he knows not how." The emphasis in this parable is that God grows His kingdom, that God is the One that gives the growth. The farmer, all he does is plant the seed, and then how it grows eludes his comprehension. It's beyond his control.He can't control how it grows. All he does is cast the seed and weight, and the seed germinates and develops by itself even while he is sleeping. He has no idea how it grows, and the Lord here is saying, "I give the growth." This is from 1 Corinthians. Paul says, "I planted, Apollos watered it, but God gave the growth."Verse 28, "The Earth produces by itself, first, the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear, and when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle because the harvest has come." Our job is to preach the word. Our job is to sow the seed of God's word. What God does with His word is His business. It's only for us to make sure we're faithful in our sowing.This is our responsibility, but God is the One that gives the growth. The soil can't produce life apart from the seed, but why? Because humans are dead in sin. Life must come from the outside, and it comes from the word of God. He says, "First, the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear."The children of God are not born in perfect faith or perfect hope, or perfect knowledge or experience, but the moment you become a child of God, even the weakest child of God is a true child of God, and the true child of God is expected by God to grow. If God began the process of salvation, He's promised He's going to complete it, and the process of salvation includes maturity and growth. Philippians 1:6, "And I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ." He's the one that starts the work, and He will bring it to completion. What's our job?We are to grow ... In 1 Peter 3:18 says, "But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him, be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. This is how the reign of God grows in your life.You grow in grace, grow in grace by the means of grace, studying scripture, and praying, and worshiping the Lord. We receive grace when we recognize that we've sinned. "Lord, give me more grace and power me with that grace," and that's how maturity, that's how growth come. The real cause of agent of the words fruition isn't the farmer, it's the seed. It's God Himself.He says, "Keep sowing, keep sowing, keep sowing until the day of harvest comes." The day of harvest in scripture from Joel, from Revelation we see, the day of harvest is actually an image of judgment. A time when evil is judged and righteousness is vindicated. For example, Revelation 14:15, "And another angel came out of the temple calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, 'Out in your sickle and reap for the hour to reap has come for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe.'" The harvest is, in the Lord's parable, is a symbol of the end of the age, the last judgment, the consummation of history, and we have the same text in Joel 3:13, "Put in the stickle for the harvest is ripe.""Go in, tread, for the winepress is full. The vats overflow, for their evil is great." Jesus here is showing us a picture of the whole period of world history from the first coming of Christ to the second coming of Christ, from His first advent to the next, and Jesus is saying that, "Kingdom is growing. The kingdom is growing. The kingdom is growing.Sow the seed, the kingdom is growing, but a day will come when finally, it's time for reaping and the harvest." Our job is to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom. Were to sow the seed of the word of God. Our task is not to attempt to manipulate the seed, or force growth, or change the seed somehow. No, Jesus wants us to have complete confidence, that there's life in the seed itself, the word of God is living inactive, and the word of God is going to accomplish the work that God has for it.We are to trust in it, hope in it, and recognize that the kingdom of God is unstoppable, the kingdom of God is inevitable, and God is going to save all of the elect. Galatians 6:9, "Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season, we will reap if we do not give up." One of the reasons why this church even exists is because we believe this. We've believed this from the very beginning when we establish the church. We said, "What kind of church do we ..."We want to be a church that's faithful of God's word, and we want to do God's work God's way. Sometimes it does feel like the soil here isn't really soil, but it's kind of like concrete, and I remember a while back, I was walking my daughters to school, and I saw the pavement of a sidewalk with a little sprout growing. I was like, "Oh, that's cute," and I just walked by, and then a few weeks later, I'm walking ... I look at it, I'm like, "I can't believe it." It was a tomato plant, a tomato plant just out of the sidewalk with a little tomato, and I should have plucked it.I should have plucked it. I should have had it. I didn't plant it, though, and it was just an image of like, "No matter what, God's seeds can break through even the hardness of payment." Can God save people in Boston, Massachusetts? Of course He can, and He does, and we see it at this church, and we see it in the other gospel proclaiming ministries we support.The point of, and this is what Jesus closed it with, there's room for all in the kingdom of God. Mark 4:30, and He said, "With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? How do we understand the kingdom of God?" Here, He's quoting from Isaiah, "To whom will we liken God or what likeness compare with Him?" Jesus is saying that the kingdom is a kingdom that's going to grow.It starts and it looks like a tiny, little seed, as tiny even as a mustard seed, but it's going to grow because God promised the. Previous parable is a call to patience. The seed's going to grow surely, slowly, but surely. This parable is a call to hope. It's not only going to grow, it's going to grow massively, so we can confidently sow and not grow weary and not grow discouraged, not lose heart.But remember, the promise that God said, "I will build my church and the gates of hell will not overcome it." We are to be content with the growth that God sends us, but we are never complacent. We are thankful for all the people that God saved here in and through this church, and sanctify, but we're not complacent. We do believe that God wants this church to grow. He wants the kingdom of God to grow.We are a kingdom building force, and how do we build the kingdom? By sowing the seed, and the seed can be even as small as a grain of mustard seed. Verse 31, "It's like a grain of mustard seed, which when sown on the ground is the smallest of all the seeds on the earth," and here, Jesus is hyperbolic. He's comparing something very tiny, mustard seed to something great, and that's the growth that comes from the mustard seed, over 700 mustard seeds to a gram, and the height of the bush or the tree can grow to 10 feet. What He's saying is that the kingdom of God grows like this.In the beginnings, there's small, paltry in appearance, but there's tremendous power, divine potency in the word of God. The mustard seed is chosen because of its commonness, and because of its smallness, but it grows into something vast and incredible. What is Jesus here saying? He's saying, "Well, look how the kingdom came into the world initially, and weakness." How did the King of kings, the King of the universe come into this world?He came as a baby, born in a manger, at Bethlehem, without riches, without armies, without attendance, without power. And who are the men that God chose to build His church? Who were the appointed apostles? Just average men. What was the last public act of Jesus' earthly ministry as the King of kings?Well, He was crucified between two criminals, between two thieves, and He was forsaken by His disciples, betrayed by one, denied by another. What was the doctrine that the first apostles, the first builders of the church ... What was the doctrine they preached? They preached Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and to Greeks. It was foolishness, but because of the Holy Spirit, when the Holy Spirit took that message, that we have all sinned, we have all transgressed the commandments of God, Jesus Christ lived a perfect life on our behalf, and then He died on a cross as our substitutionary atonement, and then He rose in the third day, and whoever believes in Christ has all of their sins blotted out, forgiven.It's as if God cast our sins as far from us, says the east is from the west. He chooses to not just forgive, but forget our sins. When that message was proclaimed and the Holy Spirit took and applied to people's hearts, lives were changed. The world was changed, in the same way that the gospel changed people's lives, then He does so today. In all this, the mind of man can only look at Christ, can only look at His disciples and see weakness and feebleness, but we, as believers, we understand that beyond the feebleness, beyond the weakness, is the power of God, a power that can truly save. Mark 4:32, "Yet, when it is sown, it grows up and it becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade."Now, this phrase, birds of the air is used in Ezekiel 31 and Daniel 4. It's to represent the multitude of the nations, that the kingdom grows and it's going to grow in vastness, and then people of all nations are going to come and build nests within this tree. Ezekiel 17:23, "On the mountain height of Israel, will I plant it, that it may bear branches and produce fruit and become a noble cedar, and under it will dwell every kind of bird in the shadow of its branches, birds of every sort will nest." Every time this phrase is used in the Old Testament, describing a mighty kingdom, be it Israel or Egypt or Babylon, the kingdoms will gross in vastness, that the other nations will come and seek refuge in this kingdom. What Jesus is saying here is, "My kingdom is like that.""My kingdom, the kingdom of God is like this, though its beginnings are improbable, a small seed, a crucified Messiah, suffering church, preaching, baptizing, and holding holy communion, praying. Its beginnings are improbable, but its destiny is vast, and there's room for all." In the kingdom of God, there's room for every single one of you, there's room for every single one of your families, there's room for everyone in the world that will come and repent, and to build a nest. I like the idea of just building a little nest with your loved ones. In the kingdom of God, He's like, "Make sure you're building this home that you have in the kingdom of God.""Come and find shelter," Jesus is saying, "In the shade of this kingdom." The parable emphasizes the shelter that the kingdom brings. In Psalm 91, "He who dwells in the shelter of the most high will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, 'My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust, for He will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings, you will find refuge. His faithfulness is a shield and a buckler.'"Jesus concludes our text in Mark 4:33. "With many such parables, He spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it. He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately, to His own disciples, He explained everything," as they were able to hear according to their God-given ability to hear. What He's saying is, and He concludes with this, if you want more revelation, you do it by spending more time with Christ, by following Christ, by communing with Him and abiding in Him. Three points to summarize, and then we'll close with prayer, love the light, hunger for truth, and then share the gains.Sow the seed, trust God for growth, harvest is coming, and there's room for all in the kingdom of God. Let us pray. Lord, we thank You for continuing to build Your kingdom in and through us in this city, in a place of stifling darkness, sometimes it seems, but Lord, You are the Light, and You're the Light that shines in the darkness. Lord, as you saved us, we believe that You can save others, and we pray that You use us in the process, even this week, Lord. Give us opportunities to speak of You, speak of the gospel, speak of Your grace.We pray that You open the door for the proclamation of the gospel here. We pray for revival in this city and beyond. We pray for an awakening, and we pray that, Lord, You save many and draw them to yourself and to Your incredible kingdom, and we pray this in Christ's holy name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
The Unstoppable Kingdom

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 29, 2023 46:41


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com.Heavenly Father, we thank You that You are God overall, and even over those who don't yet confess Jesus Christ as Lord, You are Lord over them as well. Lord, we thank You for regulating revelation of Your holy truth. By Your Spirit, you're the one that illumines the truth into our hearts, and we pray for more revelation in our church. We pray for more revelation given to us, not just so we can store it, or hold it, or keep it unto ourselves, but so that we can share it with others. As we get light, as we get knowledge and discernment and wisdom, I pray that You give us the unction of the Holy Spirit, the power of the Spirit to then share it with others.As we come to know who You are, let us be a people that wants to testify to the greatness of Your holy name. Lord, You are so holy, even Your name is holy, and we pray that Your name will be hollowed in our church, in our hearts, and our lives, and we pray that Your name will be hollowed and considered holy and revered in the city. Lord, there are many who don't yet follow You, don't yet even believe in You, and we pray for a revival. We pray for an awakening. We do believe that Your kingdom is unstoppable.You promised that there was nothing that is going to remain hidden, You will reveal all truth, and we pray, Lord, use us in the process of this harvest of drawn many to Yourself. Give us a zeal, a burning zeal in our hearts to do everything we possibly can to see people whom we love, come to faith, to receive eternal life, to receive the power of the Holy Spirit, and to receive forgiveness of sins and a relationship with You. Lord, we pray that You instill a hope in us, a hope that is unshakeable so people around us do realize there's something different about these people, they do believe, and they build their life on this hope. And we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen.We're continuing our sermon series to do with the incredible gospel of Mark. We've called it Kingdom Come, the Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom, and the title today is the Unstoppable Kingdom. Question, "What's one thing that grows the more you share it? The more you give it to others, the more you test it, the more you share, what is that one thing that grows?," and I would submit to you, it's your faith. The more you share your faith, the deeper your faith gets.The more you testify to the truth of God, the deeper your understanding of that truth is. Jesus Christ told us, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men. I'll make you compel people to come into the kingdom. I'm saving you as an instrument of salvation for others." That's part of our purpose.1 Peter 3:15 says, "But in your hearts honor Christ, the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect." We should be such hope-filled people, that people around us are like mesmerized by this hope that we have no matter what the circumstances. No matter what the situation in the world, we have an unshakable hope. Why are you a follower of Jesus Christ? Well, it's because the Lord sent someone to you at some point to sow the seeds of God's word into your heart, and the fact that you're following Jesus today is evidence that the seed was planted into fertile soil.The seed goes deep and it germinates, and a root system goes deep into your heart, and that seed grows as it is nourished by the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit bears fruit through us, and the fruit that the Holy Spirit bears has seeds, and that's the seed of God's word, and we are then to take those seeds and we are to sow those seeds into the heart soils of other people. Then, by the power of God, they too are saved. They're saved from God's judgment. They're saved for God's kingdom and His mission, and the intention is clear from these parables that the Lord is giving us today. We are not only to receive knowledge, but do everything we can to impart that knowledge to others, and this is how the kingdom of God grows in your life and in the world.Today, we're in Mark 4:21-34. Would you look at the text with me? "And He said to them, 'Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand? For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest, nor is anything secret except to come to light. If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear.'""And He said to them, 'Pay attention to what you hear, with the measure you use, it will be measured to you, and still more will be added to you. For to the one who has more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.' And He said, 'The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows. He knows not how. The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear, but when the grain is ripe at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.'""And He said, 'With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which when sown on the ground is the smallest of the seeds on the earth, yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.' With many such parables He spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it. He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to His own disciples, He explained everything." This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word.May He write these truths on our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, love the light, hunger for truth, and share the gains, second, sow the seed, trust God for growth, harvest is coming, and third, there's room for all in the kingdom of God. First, love the light, hunger for truth, and share the gains. So Jesus, in the previous text, has interpreted the parable of the sower, and now, He gives us a few more parables, of the lamp, of the hidden in the manifest of having, and not having, and that the kingdom grows like seed.These parables, with their emphasis on revelation and the necessity of paying attention, extends the theme of the word and its hearers. Verse 21, "And He said to them, 'Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand?'" Jesus uses very similar phrasing in the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5:14, Jesus said, "You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.""In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." Now, the text in Matthew 5 is very clear. Don't hide your light. Be good witnesses to Jesus Christ, and this world do good works so people see the good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. It's tempting when you come across a text like ours to say, "Oh, there's a similar phrase that's used in a different text like Matthew 5," and just assume that Jesus means the same thing because He used the same phrase.Jesus, just like us, often uses the same expressions and different context to communicate different truths. So just because Jesus is using the same image, or the same expression, or the same phraseology doesn't automatically mean He's saying the same thing. We have to pay attention to the context. In Matthew 5:15, Jesus is urging us to do something. You shine your light to the world.Here, Jesus is promising us something wonderful. He's not just calling us to action, but He's giving us a promise, and the promise is about the destiny of the kingdom of God. The parable is teaching us that the future for the kingdom of God is bright, and I just want to point out a couple of things from the text. In our translation, the English standard, it just says a light. There's no definite article.The definite article is the. In the original Greek, there is a definite article before the word, lamp, so it's the lamp. A particular lamp is in view, and where the text says that the lamp is brought in, the Greek actually says, "Does the lamp come in?" It isn't brought in, it comes in all on its own. There's a personal agency ascribed to the lamp. Meaning, the lamp is a person.The lamp comes in. The lamp here is the Lord Jesus Christ, and this is what Jesus taught us about His identity in John 8:12. "Again, Jesus spoke to them saying, 'I, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.'" So probably, the best way to read verse 21 in our text is that the lamp is the revelation of God and His kingdom as has come in the person, the words, the works of Jesus Christ.It's a message, a revelation summarized in the message of the gospel. If the lamp is here and the gospel of the kingdom is here, Jesus is saying, "What's the intent?" It's here in order to be exposed. It's here in order to shine. This is what He's telling His disciples.He says, "Be patient. When it looks like the darkness in the world is oppressive, when it looks like there's so much darkness, that no light can penetrate that darkness, be patient. Continue to believe." Even with Christ, many were opposing Him. There was an antagonism that was growing amongst the Scribes and the Pharisees, and partially because they didn't want the light of God in their life.This is a lot of people, they want God's love, but they don't want God's light, but God is Love and He is Light, and you can't have one part of Him without all of Him. Many people love John 3:16, a verse that many have memorized even since Sunday school, but in the context about God loving the world, He does say like the world has rejected this love because they don't want the light, they want to continue living in darkness. Look at John 3:16-21, "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.""And this is the judgment, the light has come into the world and people love the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed, but whoever does what is true comes to the light so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God." He's saying the light has come and the light has come in the form of Jesus Christ, and people reject Him because people loved darkness. This is what the difference between a believer and non-believer. A believer has a brand new heart.You're regenerated. When you repent of your sin, you're given this brand new heart that longs for God's light. You want to love the light. You love standing in the light, living in the light. You love being a child of the Light, and you love God's word because God's word illuminates more of your life. It shows you more of the ways that you are to walk in and the ways that you are not to walk in light that shows the way to live.Psalm 119:105 says, "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path." So even in the short-term, God intends those outside even if He does intend that they misunderstand this word. It's not going to be hidden forever. The truth is here, and even if people suppress that truth, there will come a point where the suppression is no longer even possible. Mark 4:22, Jesus continues, says, "For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest, nor is anything secret except to come to light."He did not come to have His light hidden away, and the whole point of His coming in this veiled form, often rejected form, was so that the light might shine, undim to the ends of the earth. He came in weakness and suffering. He came as a seed to be buried in the ground. Look at Isaiah 53, one of the most powerful, prophetic passages about the person of Christ. "Who has believed what He has heard from us and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?""For He grew up before Him like a young plant and like a root out of dry ground. He had no form or majesty that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by man, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces. He was despised and we esteemed Him not." Just as in the past, nothing was hidden except in order to become manifest, so Jesus is saying this is true.Even now, in the present, all the hiddenness of the current age will ultimately serve the purpose of revelation. This is exactly what happened with the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Jesus, who is God, the Son of God, King of kings, comes and He proclaims the word of the kingdom. "The kingdom is here. Repent and believe. Everyone who repents and believes is welcome."But the opponents of Jesus, they misunderstood His word, and they rejected it. The word didn't penetrate their hearts, it didn't transform them, but this rejection of the word led to Jesus' death, and as a result from the divine perspective, it led to ultimate revelation, more revelation. He was killed by those who refuse to believe His word, refuse to see His identity, but in this divinely will death, which is caused by their spiritual blindness, God ushers in a brand new age of revelation. After Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Jesus now is proclaimed as the Messiah, as the Son of God, and after the Holy Spirit falls on Pentecost. Now, when the message of the gospel was proclaimed, the Holy Spirit takes that message and transforms people.He saves people. The obscurity of the word ultimately serves to lead to greater revelation. The lamp of God's word has come into the room and is casting its light into every crevice for everyone who would welcome the light into their heart. 1 John 2:8-11, "At the same time, it is a new commandment that I'm writing to you, which is true in Him and in you because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining. Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him, there is no cause for stumbling, but whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes." At the same time, we look around the world and we say, "Well, if the light has come and the light is revealing the kingdom of God, why aren't more people Christians? Why aren't more people following the word of God?," and Jesus here says, "There will come a time when everything is revealed, and at that point, it will be too late." The kingdom will not remain hidden forever. It is seemingly hidden now, in that its full power is not evident, it's concealed in some way, but there will be a day when the kingdom is completely revealed because the light of function is to expose the darkness.The kingdom of God, the kingdom of Jesus Christ cannot stay hidden. Nothing can obscure it. No shadow can engulf it or eclipse it. Why are we believers? Because God shown His light into our heart so that the knowledge of the glory of Jesus Christ is understood.The light of the gospel is chasing away the shadows of unbelief, and the people who walked in darkness are beginning to see the light. And what's our job? Our job is to believe this promise, that the kingdom is unstoppable, that the gospel light will continue to shine and God will draw the elect, will draw His children to Himself. And what's our job in the process? We are to love the truth, hunger for the truth, and impart the truth for others. The light isn't just given to us so we enjoy our lives here on earth until we go to heaven.No. We have work to do to testify to Jesus Christ, that He alone is the Doctor of our souls, that He alone is the Way to salvation. There's no other name by which anyone will be saved. That day, the judgment day, or when Christ returns will reveal that to everybody, and for most people, will be too late then. I understand in a place like Boston, it's easy to lose your hope.You look around, you're like, "We are outnumbered. Big league, we are outnumbered. We are on the losing side," and that is a lie of the enemy. As soon as you begin to believe that lie, we lose the power. We are to believe that Jesus' kingdom is growing, will continue to grow, and sometimes it feels like our light just isn't enough.It feels like you're in Fenway Park, all the lights are out, you're by yourself, and you want to light up the night just a little bit. You take out your phone with a little flashlight, and you're like, "Yeah, the light of Jesus," and it looks pathetic, puny, flickering even. It seems like the darkness is absolute impenetrable. You say, "What can my little light do?," and then you realize, "It's not my light. It's not my light, it's not my lamp."The light is Jesus Christ Himself. The light is God. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Do you believe this? Do you believe that there is no one beyond the reach of Jesus Christ? Do you believe that there is no heart so hard, that grace cannot soften it and change it forever?The light will pierce the darkness. We just need to proclaim that Jesus is the Light. He is the only Way of salvation. I'm confident of that because of the promise here, that the light came not to be hidden, it came to blaze forth and to give light to the world, and nothing can stop Jesus Christ. Nothing can stop the King.Last week, I shared that I had a toothache, and thank you for all your condolences. It was supposed to be solved on Tuesday. I woke up the happiest person to get a root canal ever. I even got a shirt, buttoned. I was like, "I'm ready to go."Did my hair. I'm like, "I'm ready to go to the endodontist." I show up, and they say, "Thank you for coming for your consultation." I was like, "What? No."So my dental appointment is on Tuesday. Tuesday is coming. Praise be to God. And so I was at a staff meeting. I came into the staff meeting on Thursday. We were praying for one another, and I shared about my toothpaste, and Raquel was praying for me, and Raquel starts praying, and it's just powerful, and then she's like, "Lord, you see the decay in Pastor Jan's tooth, just decay.""Decay. He's decaying. He's fallen apart. Decay, decay, decay." And that's all I heard.I'm like, "I am ... Yup." I said, "Amen." We are all decaying. I just want to just share that tremendous news. We are all mortal.We are all going to die. Time will be up for each one of us. The Lord knows when that is, but I'm telling you, dear soul, dear eternal soul, that moment will come, and you will stand before Jesus Christ, and you will stand before Him as forgiven, welcome into the presence of God, or He will stand before you like a judge. It's one or the other. This is what Jesus is saying, that the kingdom is inevitable.This is true. This is the greatest truth that there is. This is the truth underneath every single truth, that Jesus Christ is King, and the only way that we can be forgiven of our law-breaking, of our insubordination, of our rebellion against the King, is to fall on our knees and say, "Lord Jesus, please forgive me of all my sins. Lord Jesus, I repent," and Jesus Christ says, "The love of God will be poured into your heart. The light of God will be poured into your mind, and you will be transformed."This has to be real for every believer. When we meet friends who are not Christians, who are not followers of Christ, you need to believe that they are on their way to hell, eternal damnation apart from Jesus Christ, and this is why we proclaim the gospel, this is why we do what we do. This is the truth, and our job is to sow the seed of the gospel, and not to be afraid of it, not to be afraid of speaking the truth. There are proponents of other religions who are 10 times, 100 times more courageous than most Christians today. I watched the UFC.A lot of Muslim fighters are in there, and they're all, "Inshallah," and they're just saying, "Praise be to God. If God wills ..." They're just throwing in God in every ... I'm like, "Imagine if believers did that, just on a daily basis, speaking the name of Christ every opportunity that we get, no matter what cost." Why? Because that's how important it is.In Mark 4:23, He says, "If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear." He's saying that ears to hear this message are a gift from God. Repentance is a gift from God. Faith is a gift from God, but using the ears that God has given us, that's our responsibility. We are to say, "Lord, tune our ears to hear Your voice and give us grace to hear."In verse 24, "And He said to them, 'Pay attention to what you hear, with the measure you use, it will be measured to you and still more will be added to you." The wake-up call is repeated and reinforced, pay attention to what you hear. He's not saying that it's just hearing per se, you hear. No. It's hearing to understand.It's hearing with the commitment to obey no matter what it says. Also, he says, "See what you hear." That's the original. It's the sense of hearing doubled by the sense of sight, suggesting we're going to use all of our faculties to listen to the word of God, and significant in the wording, the call is to pay attention not just to how we hear, but to what we listen to. Be careful in the voices you'll allow into your life and to your heart in a world that is still, in some sense, Satan's house and his dominion.Not all voices who claim to be speaking on behalf of God really are. Many of the voices are deceitful, perhaps even satanic in claiming to be God's word. Later on in Mark 13, Jesus says that, "Satan does everything he can to lead astray if possible, even the elect." So we, as believers need to be careful, careful of the voices we allow. Listening sermons is important.You should listen to sermons, but I want you versed in the scriptures more than you are in sermons so that you can discern, "Is this truly the word of God or not?" On the other hand, when we listen to God's word with the intent to obey, God gives us more revelation, and as He does, He continues to draw us to the calling that He has for us to go and preach the gospel, to receive, and then also share the gains that we have. Romans 10:14, "How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed, and how are they to believe in Him of whom they have never heard? How are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news?,' but they have not all believed the gospel, for Isaiah says, 'Lord, who has believed what He has heard from us?'""So faith comes from hearing and hearing from the word of Christ." In Ephesians 1:13, "In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory." He says, "With the measure you use, it will be measured to you and still more will be added to you." Mark here takes a phrase that was known in ancient literature, a phrase that had to do with giving. If you give to others, whatever you give will return to you, but here, he applies it to epistemology, knowledge of God, in particular.What He's saying is if you receive insight from the Lord, if you receive it with a welcome heart and a pure heart, you will get more insight, and the measure of our engagement with the word, the way we respond, our desire to grasp its message and digest its truth, no matter how hard to chew, will determine the measure of blessing we enjoy from it. Do you want more blessing? Of course we do. He says, "Pay closer attention." The word teaches clearly that if you come close to God, He will come close to you.He will draw near to you. If you take a tiny step toward God, God will more than match the movement. In verse 25, He says, "For to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away." Now, Proverbs 13:4 says, "The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied." Diligence.Are you diligent about your faith? The Christians that I know, that I've seen them grow spiritually by leaps and bounds, and the ones that have grown in spiritual prosperity are those who are diligent, diligent in their study of scripture on a daily basis, diligent over private devotions and private prayer, diligent over attending worship services and community groups, in the same way that exercise and use of muscles are strengthened with exercise so that the soul is strengthened when we exercise the means of grace that God has given us, and we are to expend all energy to listen to the word and the promises that we will be proportionally rewarded. Those who heed the message get more understanding of the message, get more revelation, get more blessing. Those who do not heed the message end up with nothing, and the idea of the rich getting richer applies to truth, that God gives wisdom to the wise, and He gives grace to those who long for insight and knowledge. For example, Daniel 2:19-23, "Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night.""Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. Daniel answered and said, 'Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons. He removes kings and sets up kings. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding.""He reveals deep and hidden things. He knows what is in the darkness and the light dwells with him. To You, O God, of my fathers that give thanks and praise, for You have given me wisdom and might and have now made known to me what we asked of you, for You have made known to us the kings matter." So we are to pay careful attention to how we listen, to what we listen in terms of the word of God, and let the measure of your response to the word be full, and complete, and heartfelt, and diligent, and real, and those who give themselves to the word like this, they gain much. What do you gain when you pay attention to the word?You gain eternal life. You gain a relationship with God. You gain energy and strength to persevere despite trials. You gain comforts that the world cannot even imagine and you gain a hope that no tragedy can touch, and you gain heaven itself. But to those who hear the word and do not respond like this, but respond with tepid indifference, "Oh, yeah, God," "Oh, yeah, God's word," "Oh, yeah, Christ dying on the cross, bleeding, crucifixion," "Oh, yeah, Jan, I've heard that before," well, Jesus says those who listen like that, even what they have will be taken away.So the word of God when proclaimed, no matter how familiar you are with the word, you can't ignore it. What a joy and peace we have in the word. In particular, watch for those texts in holy scripture where you are tempted to plug your ears with your fingers. "No, that's not for me. Yeah, they say that that's God's word, but that's not for me."Pay close attention to those texts. Some of you have been walking with Christ for years, and your relationship with the Lord has just grown cold. There's no obvious rebellion in your life, but it just feels like your faith is like stale bread, left out too long, dry, crusty, and moldy. The word used to come to you like fresh water from a rock in the desert, like manna from heaven, and now you just sit in services or you're reading scripture, and there's just nothing. There's no life, there's no interest.There's just boredom. At these moments, the Lord is speaking to you and say, "Pay attention. Pay attention to what you hear, how you hear because the stakes are that high," and Jesus today invites you to turn away from your lukewarmness and draw near to Him, and ask the, "Lord, send me this hunger. Send me a thirst for Your presence and for Your word, and give me this attentiveness, this desire to hear it no matter what and to obey," and the Lord will meet you there. Second, sow the seed, trust God for growth, and harvest is coming.Mark 4:26-27, "And He said, 'The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows, he knows not how." The emphasis in this parable is that God grows His kingdom, that God is the One that gives the growth. The farmer, all he does is plant the seed, and then how it grows eludes his comprehension. It's beyond his control.He can't control how it grows. All he does is cast the seed and weight, and the seed germinates and develops by itself even while he is sleeping. He has no idea how it grows, and the Lord here is saying, "I give the growth." This is from 1 Corinthians. Paul says, "I planted, Apollos watered it, but God gave the growth."Verse 28, "The Earth produces by itself, first, the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear, and when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle because the harvest has come." Our job is to preach the word. Our job is to sow the seed of God's word. What God does with His word is His business. It's only for us to make sure we're faithful in our sowing.This is our responsibility, but God is the One that gives the growth. The soil can't produce life apart from the seed, but why? Because humans are dead in sin. Life must come from the outside, and it comes from the word of God. He says, "First, the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear."The children of God are not born in perfect faith or perfect hope, or perfect knowledge or experience, but the moment you become a child of God, even the weakest child of God is a true child of God, and the true child of God is expected by God to grow. If God began the process of salvation, He's promised He's going to complete it, and the process of salvation includes maturity and growth. Philippians 1:6, "And I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ." He's the one that starts the work, and He will bring it to completion. What's our job?We are to grow ... In 1 Peter 3:18 says, "But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him, be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. This is how the reign of God grows in your life.You grow in grace, grow in grace by the means of grace, studying scripture, and praying, and worshiping the Lord. We receive grace when we recognize that we've sinned. "Lord, give me more grace and power me with that grace," and that's how maturity, that's how growth come. The real cause of agent of the words fruition isn't the farmer, it's the seed. It's God Himself.He says, "Keep sowing, keep sowing, keep sowing until the day of harvest comes." The day of harvest in scripture from Joel, from Revelation we see, the day of harvest is actually an image of judgment. A time when evil is judged and righteousness is vindicated. For example, Revelation 14:15, "And another angel came out of the temple calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, 'Out in your sickle and reap for the hour to reap has come for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe.'" The harvest is, in the Lord's parable, is a symbol of the end of the age, the last judgment, the consummation of history, and we have the same text in Joel 3:13, "Put in the stickle for the harvest is ripe.""Go in, tread, for the winepress is full. The vats overflow, for their evil is great." Jesus here is showing us a picture of the whole period of world history from the first coming of Christ to the second coming of Christ, from His first advent to the next, and Jesus is saying that, "Kingdom is growing. The kingdom is growing. The kingdom is growing.Sow the seed, the kingdom is growing, but a day will come when finally, it's time for reaping and the harvest." Our job is to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom. Were to sow the seed of the word of God. Our task is not to attempt to manipulate the seed, or force growth, or change the seed somehow. No, Jesus wants us to have complete confidence, that there's life in the seed itself, the word of God is living inactive, and the word of God is going to accomplish the work that God has for it.We are to trust in it, hope in it, and recognize that the kingdom of God is unstoppable, the kingdom of God is inevitable, and God is going to save all of the elect. Galatians 6:9, "Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season, we will reap if we do not give up." One of the reasons why this church even exists is because we believe this. We've believed this from the very beginning when we establish the church. We said, "What kind of church do we ..."We want to be a church that's faithful of God's word, and we want to do God's work God's way. Sometimes it does feel like the soil here isn't really soil, but it's kind of like concrete, and I remember a while back, I was walking my daughters to school, and I saw the pavement of a sidewalk with a little sprout growing. I was like, "Oh, that's cute," and I just walked by, and then a few weeks later, I'm walking ... I look at it, I'm like, "I can't believe it." It was a tomato plant, a tomato plant just out of the sidewalk with a little tomato, and I should have plucked it.I should have plucked it. I should have had it. I didn't plant it, though, and it was just an image of like, "No matter what, God's seeds can break through even the hardness of payment." Can God save people in Boston, Massachusetts? Of course He can, and He does, and we see it at this church, and we see it in the other gospel proclaiming ministries we support.The point of, and this is what Jesus closed it with, there's room for all in the kingdom of God. Mark 4:30, and He said, "With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? How do we understand the kingdom of God?" Here, He's quoting from Isaiah, "To whom will we liken God or what likeness compare with Him?" Jesus is saying that the kingdom is a kingdom that's going to grow.It starts and it looks like a tiny, little seed, as tiny even as a mustard seed, but it's going to grow because God promised the. Previous parable is a call to patience. The seed's going to grow surely, slowly, but surely. This parable is a call to hope. It's not only going to grow, it's going to grow massively, so we can confidently sow and not grow weary and not grow discouraged, not lose heart.But remember, the promise that God said, "I will build my church and the gates of hell will not overcome it." We are to be content with the growth that God sends us, but we are never complacent. We are thankful for all the people that God saved here in and through this church, and sanctify, but we're not complacent. We do believe that God wants this church to grow. He wants the kingdom of God to grow.We are a kingdom building force, and how do we build the kingdom? By sowing the seed, and the seed can be even as small as a grain of mustard seed. Verse 31, "It's like a grain of mustard seed, which when sown on the ground is the smallest of all the seeds on the earth," and here, Jesus is hyperbolic. He's comparing something very tiny, mustard seed to something great, and that's the growth that comes from the mustard seed, over 700 mustard seeds to a gram, and the height of the bush or the tree can grow to 10 feet. What He's saying is that the kingdom of God grows like this.In the beginnings, there's small, paltry in appearance, but there's tremendous power, divine potency in the word of God. The mustard seed is chosen because of its commonness, and because of its smallness, but it grows into something vast and incredible. What is Jesus here saying? He's saying, "Well, look how the kingdom came into the world initially, and weakness." How did the King of kings, the King of the universe come into this world?He came as a baby, born in a manger, at Bethlehem, without riches, without armies, without attendance, without power. And who are the men that God chose to build His church? Who were the appointed apostles? Just average men. What was the last public act of Jesus' earthly ministry as the King of kings?Well, He was crucified between two criminals, between two thieves, and He was forsaken by His disciples, betrayed by one, denied by another. What was the doctrine that the first apostles, the first builders of the church ... What was the doctrine they preached? They preached Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and to Greeks. It was foolishness, but because of the Holy Spirit, when the Holy Spirit took that message, that we have all sinned, we have all transgressed the commandments of God, Jesus Christ lived a perfect life on our behalf, and then He died on a cross as our substitutionary atonement, and then He rose in the third day, and whoever believes in Christ has all of their sins blotted out, forgiven.It's as if God cast our sins as far from us, says the east is from the west. He chooses to not just forgive, but forget our sins. When that message was proclaimed and the Holy Spirit took and applied to people's hearts, lives were changed. The world was changed, in the same way that the gospel changed people's lives, then He does so today. In all this, the mind of man can only look at Christ, can only look at His disciples and see weakness and feebleness, but we, as believers, we understand that beyond the feebleness, beyond the weakness, is the power of God, a power that can truly save. Mark 4:32, "Yet, when it is sown, it grows up and it becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade."Now, this phrase, birds of the air is used in Ezekiel 31 and Daniel 4. It's to represent the multitude of the nations, that the kingdom grows and it's going to grow in vastness, and then people of all nations are going to come and build nests within this tree. Ezekiel 17:23, "On the mountain height of Israel, will I plant it, that it may bear branches and produce fruit and become a noble cedar, and under it will dwell every kind of bird in the shadow of its branches, birds of every sort will nest." Every time this phrase is used in the Old Testament, describing a mighty kingdom, be it Israel or Egypt or Babylon, the kingdoms will gross in vastness, that the other nations will come and seek refuge in this kingdom. What Jesus is saying here is, "My kingdom is like that.""My kingdom, the kingdom of God is like this, though its beginnings are improbable, a small seed, a crucified Messiah, suffering church, preaching, baptizing, and holding holy communion, praying. Its beginnings are improbable, but its destiny is vast, and there's room for all." In the kingdom of God, there's room for every single one of you, there's room for every single one of your families, there's room for everyone in the world that will come and repent, and to build a nest. I like the idea of just building a little nest with your loved ones. In the kingdom of God, He's like, "Make sure you're building this home that you have in the kingdom of God.""Come and find shelter," Jesus is saying, "In the shade of this kingdom." The parable emphasizes the shelter that the kingdom brings. In Psalm 91, "He who dwells in the shelter of the most high will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, 'My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust, for He will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings, you will find refuge. His faithfulness is a shield and a buckler.'"Jesus concludes our text in Mark 4:33. "With many such parables, He spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it. He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately, to His own disciples, He explained everything," as they were able to hear according to their God-given ability to hear. What He's saying is, and He concludes with this, if you want more revelation, you do it by spending more time with Christ, by following Christ, by communing with Him and abiding in Him. Three points to summarize, and then we'll close with prayer, love the light, hunger for truth, and then share the gains.Sow the seed, trust God for growth, harvest is coming, and there's room for all in the kingdom of God. Let us pray. Lord, we thank You for continuing to build Your kingdom in and through us in this city, in a place of stifling darkness, sometimes it seems, but Lord, You are the Light, and You're the Light that shines in the darkness. Lord, as you saved us, we believe that You can save others, and we pray that You use us in the process, even this week, Lord. Give us opportunities to speak of You, speak of the gospel, speak of Your grace.We pray that You open the door for the proclamation of the gospel here. We pray for revival in this city and beyond. We pray for an awakening, and we pray that, Lord, You save many and draw them to yourself and to Your incredible kingdom, and we pray this in Christ's holy name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Pay Attention To God

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 22, 2023 57:14


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you that you are good, and glorious, and gracious. And despite our sin, because of your loving kindness and grace, you sent your son, Jesus Christ, the word of God. Jesus, everything was created through you. Nothing was created apart from you because you are the word of God. God spoke everything into existence ex nihilo. And Jesus, you, the word of God, came to reveal yourself, and you do that. You reveal God to us through the written word of God. I pray, Lord, in the same way that everything was created, I pray that you recreate us by your word today. I pray that you give us tender hearts, humble hearts that are teachable, hearts that can truly pay attention to you, pay attention to your word, to listen in order to heed and obey. I pray, Lord, if there's anything in the soil of our hearts that is not conducive to the seed growing, be it thorns, or thistles, or rocks, or hardness, I pray today by your love and by the power of the Spirit, till, break the ground up. No matter how painful it is, I pray make the ground fertile by the power of the Spirit. Lord, prepare us now to hear from your holy scriptures, the holy Bible, your word. This is the seed that Jesus is talking about. And I pray this seed is planted deep in our hearts, that the root structures go deep so that the harvest may be plentiful, and make us a people who want to be fruitful, who want to bear the fruit of the spirit in our lives, and want to be fruitful by drawing others close to you by making converts, making disciples not of ourselves, but of Jesus Christ. Lord Jesus, I pray that you send a hunger for your word in this nation, in the world at large. There's a famine of your word because there's a lack of hunger for your word. And I pray that you make us a hungry people, people that hunger, in desperation cry out, "Lord, speak to us. We're ready to do your will." Lord bless our time in the holy scriptures. Holy Spirit, come meet with us. Do the deep work. I pray, prepare us to hear from you, to hear from your holy scriptures, and give us power to then go and do what it says. We pray all this in the beautiful name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series through the incredible Gospel of Mark. We're entitling the series Kingdom Come, the Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom. The title today is Pay Attention to God. In the same way that there's a difference between just viewing and actually seeing, there's a difference between hearing and listening. Hearing is the process, and function, and power of perceiving a sound. Listening is to hear with thoughtful attention. Hearing is passive and involuntary. Listening is active and requires attention. You can hear without listening, in one ear and out the other. Listening requires focus, concentration, and effort. Listening requires paying attention. One time I was taking one of my daughters to school, one of the younger ones. I always say this. It got into just habit. My parting words, my parting blessing is pay attention. There was a mom standing right next to me, and she's like, "Hey, that's a good thing to say." She turns to her son, and she's like, "Pay attention." Because kids forget. They think it's just you go have fun and it's just a social thing. Well, a lot of us, we forget to pay attention to the word of God. Many people hear God's word but they don't listen to it. They don't seek depth of understanding. And to listen to God's word also means listening with the intent to accept it and obey it no matter how paradigm-shifting the implications. And that's when true understanding comes, when you receive the word humbly and you seek to do God's will. These are the words of our Lord Jesus Christ in John 7:17. He said, "If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I'm speaking on my own authority." He's saying, "Do you want certainty that this is true, that this is truly true?" Well, do you listen with the intent to do God's will? And the more you desire to listen to God's word in order to do his will, the more understanding, the more certainty you receive that it's really God's word. Today we're in Mark 3:31 through 4:20. This paragraph at the end of chapter three, Tyler covered it last week. I'm just going to just make a few comments upon it because it does prepare us to hear the parable of the sower. Would you please look at the text with me? "And his mother and his brothers came. And standing outside, they sent to him and called him. A crowd was sitting around him, and they said to him, 'Your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.' And he answered them, 'Who are my mother and my brothers?' Looking about at those who sat around him, he said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother, and sister, and mother.'" "Again he began to teach beside the sea, and a very large crowd gather about him so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea. The whole crowd was beside the sea on the land, and he was teaching them many things in parables. And in his teaching, he said to them, 'Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. Other seed fell on rocky ground where it did not have much soil, and immediately it's sprang up since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched. And since it had no root, it withered away. "'Other seed fell among thorns and thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold, and sixtyfold, and a hundredfold. And he said, 'He who has ears to hear, let him hear.' "And when he was alone, those around him with the 12 asked him about the parables, and he said to them, 'To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God. But for those outside, everything is in parables so that they may indeed see but not perceive and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven. "And He said to them, 'Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word, and these are the ones along the path where the word is sown. Where they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground, the ones who when they hear the word immediately receive it with joy, and they have no root in themselves but endure for a while. Then when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And Others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word and it proves unfruitful. But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word, and accept it, and bear fruit thirtyfold, and sixtyfold, and a hundredfold.'" This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts, three points to frame up our time. First, the king's true family does the will of God. Second, the king reveals the secret of the kingdom of God. And hear the word, and accept it, and bear fruit. The king's true family does the will of God. In the previous text, Jesus decisively puts down his most vociferous opponents, the Pharisees and the scribes. And Jesus now turns to a more intimate "enemy" of his opponents, his family who encounter him because they think that he is out of his mind. They grew up with him. They saw him on a daily basis. And as the phrase goes, familiarity breeds contempt. So they think he's out of his mind, that he's insane. This is verse 20. "Then he went home. The crowd gathered again so that they could not even eat. And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying he's out of his mind." Jesus in the previous context said that those who follow him are those who do God's will. And those who do God's will, that's who is part of his true family. And what happens is his family who is saying that he is outside of his mind, literally in the Greek, they find themselves to be outside of the inner circle of Jesus. They find themselves, the family of Christ, to be outside of the family of God. Verse 31, "And his mother and his brothers came. And standing outside, they sent to him and called him." His family find themselves outside of his circle of followers, which is emblematic of being in opposition to God's will. His mother was Mary. His father is not mentioned after the Christmas and the advent narrative of Jesus' birth. After that narrative, Jesus' father isn't mentioned at all. Most likely it's because he has already passed away. His mother and his brothers are here. If you remember, his brothers later get converted. James and Jude actually write the later books of the New Testament. They introduce themselves as the brothers of Jesus Christ. But here they're not yet believers. And instead of responding to Jesus' call, they actually try to pull Jesus away from his mission away from doing God's will. Why? Because they absolutely misunderstand the nature of his ministry. Why? Because God's thoughts and plans run contrary to all natural human inclinations. They weren't given the revelation just yet. They needed a move of the Holy Spirit to believe in the resurrected Christ. It wasn't until probably Pentecost and the Spirit came that James and Jude were converted. Who's in the kingdom? It's those to whom the mystery has been revealed. In Mark 4:11, in our text, "He said to them, 'To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God. But for those outside, everything is in parables.'" Lesson here is friends don't let your family tempt you away from God, don't let your family pull you away from God. There are many people who have been saved at Mosaic and have been baptized at Mosaic. They say, "Look, no pictures or videos of the baptism. Because if my family finds out, there's going to be dire consequences." That's the world that we live in. And yet we are called to stand firm in Christ no matter what our family believes. We have to close our ears to the siren song even of family if they try to pull us away from the Lord. Matthew 10:34, "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I've not come to bring peace but a sword, for I've come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person's enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." In Mark 3:32, "And a crowd was sitting around him, and they said to him, 'Your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.' He answered them, 'Who are my mother and my Brothers?' looking about at those who sat around him, he said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.'" How serious were the concerns of his family for Jesus? Well, where is Jesus? He is ministering in Capernaum. He's probably living out of Peter's house in Capernaum. Where did Jesus grow up? Where is his family based out of? In Nazareth? How far is Nazareth from Capernaum? 25 miles. They make a 25-mile trek, presumably largely on foot, which tells us something about how seriously their concerns were for Christ. But when they get there, the house is so filled they can't even get in. A little about his family, from Mark chapter six, we know that Jesus has four brothers, James, and Joseph, Judas, and Simon. He also had some sisters. Interestingly, in the parallel passage in Matthew 13, Matthew talks about all of Jesus' sisters, not just both of his sisters, so the implication is there's more than two. So he's got at least three sisters and at least four brothers, so there's at least eight of them. And they didn't believe in him. They didn't believe that this was the Messiah. They didn't believe that this was the son of God. In John 7:5, "For not even his brother believed in him." You and I have a savior friends that understands, totally gets it when family gets complicated, and sometimes family gets really complicated. But Jesus bore with them, and he continued to minister to them and told about the arrival of his mother and brothers. Jesus refuses to submit to their summons. Instead, he gestures to his followers with his eyes, and he says, "These people, these who are following me, and listening to the word of God, and doing the will of God, this is my true family." Indeed, this is another demonstration of Jesus' deity. He equates following him with doing the will of God. It is remarkable condescension on God's part to call us children. It's remarkable privilege, remarkable privilege for us to be granted a place in God's family. He doesn't just call us servants. He could have just left at that. He says, "No. When we repent of our sin and trust in Jesus Christ, he becomes our older brother. God becomes our father, and we become brothers and sisters." It's a point that the text makes here by adding the word sister in that culture, at that time, this was a significant addition which validates the equality of men and women in admission to the kingdom of God. As Jesus will say later point-blank in the Sermon of the Mount, it isn't just the one who believes in Jesus that enters the kingdom of God. Jesus says, "A lot of you'll say, Lord, Lord. We knew you as Lord." And Jesus said, "You didn't do my will." He says, "A lot of you'll say, 'We did religious works in your name. We even cast out demons in your name.'" Jesus says, "That's not what brings you into the kingdom of God. No, it's doing the will of the Father in heaven." This is what repentance is, and this is why repentance is so important. Repentance is saying, "Lord, I lived doing my will. I lived according to my terms, according to my values, according to my own truth. I repent of all of that. Now I want to follow you and do your will." And these are the true sons and daughters of God who seek to do God's will. Take Abraham for example, the father of the faithful. Scripture says that Abraham believed and it was counted to him as righteousness. But the story doesn't end there. His faith led to his obedience. Later, he proved willing to sacrifice even his son Isaac should the Lord demand it. And God solemnly repeats the promises he made to him, to bless him and to make his descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky, to bless him above all nations. He said he would keep all of his promises to Abraham. Why? Because you have obeyed me. In other words, Abraham showed himself a true child of God by doing God's will. We see this same message to the very end of scripture. It says in Revelation, Christ says to the Christians in Thyatira in Revelation 2:26, "To him who does my will to the end shall be saved." In some of the very last chapters of the Bible, the beginning of account of the second coming, we're told that the bride, the church has been made ready for the wedding of the lamb. And her dress is fine linen given to her to wear. The fine linen stands for the righteous acts of the saints. The saints, in other words, are those who do the will of God. They live in obedience to his will, his commandments, and his summons. They serve the Lord. Galatians 5:6 says, "For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love." Well, what is faith working through love? We have a parallel passage that defines it. 2 Corinthians 7:19, "For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God." This new relationship with God is spiritual. It's inward. It's not outward. It's not natural, as was generally assumed by Israel in the time of Jesus. They assumed that the Messiah belonged to them by right. This was the attitude of Mary and the brothers of Jesus. This was the typical attitude of the whole nation. They confidently believed that they have a prior right to the kingdom of God because of their physical descent from Abraham. Jesus is saying physical descent in terms of kingdom of God, it actually means nothing. This is incredibly revolutionary teaching that Jesus brought in a Jewish context where the primary obligation was to one's own family. It's commanded, "Honor your father and your mother." But there's a commandment that is higher, more important than that one, which is, "Thou shall have no other gods before me." What's happening is that Jesus is acknowledging whatever claims of love and honor his natural family had on him, God, the Father, has a higher claim on him. Here, before we go into the parable of the sower or the parable of the soils, I want to meditate on Mary's faith for a bit. However bright and strong Mary's faith was when the angels came to her, when the magi came, when the shepherds came while she held infant Jesus in her arms, however strong her faith was then, somehow, the course of her journey between then and this moment has led her to a place where her faith has been eclipsed. Yes, she's had a very difficult journey. We don't know how long she's been a single mom, a single mom to eight children, no husband in the home to help. Her faith has been eclipsed because of suffering. Now we know from later on in scripture she doesn't stay here. She doesn't stay in this moment. She doesn't stay in this moment of disbelief. When her son Jesus Christ was hanging on the cross crucified and all of his disciples were scattered, bar John... One of his disciples betrayed him, the other denied him. And there she is standing there. She was there right to the very end watching her son die. The Lord Jesus Christ, in a very tender moment, speaks to her from the cross, and he entrusts her to be kept by his beloved disciple, the Apostle John. She seems to have come back to the place of trust in the Lord Jesus. But at this point in the story, her faith has suffered eclipse. At this point in the story, she's more like the first soil, hardened by suffering of life. She can't even hear the word of God. Just a moment just to meditate, I will say there are moments when we do suffer. There are moments when we go through darkness and it seems like the darkness is so thick that eclipses our faith. And friends, my pastoral encouragement to you is at those moments, do not allow Satan to steal the word of God from you. The word of God is the only nourishment to keep you going through those moments, and he will get you through. Point two is the king reveals the secret of the kingdom of God. This is Mark 4:1. "Again, he began to teach beside the sea. A very large crowd gathered about him so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land." This is the very first time the adjective very large is used. It's the biggest crowd yet. His followers are continuing to invite people to hear the message of the gospel, and the size of the group thronging about Jesus is steadily increasing. He's beside the seas preaching from a boat, which is a floating pulpit so to speak. This picture of Jesus, God, on the sea, on the boat reminds us of Psalm 29. In Psalm 29, God is sitting in royal majesty on the waters giving utterance in his earth-shattering voice. Psalm 29:1, "Ascribe to the Lord, O heavenly beings. Ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name. Worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness. The voice of the Lord is over the waters. The God of glory thunders, the Lord over many waters. The voice of the Lord is powerful. The voice of the Lord is full of majesty. The Lord sits enthroned over the flood. The Lord sits enthroned as king forever. May the Lord give strength to his people. May the Lord bless his people with peace." He got into the boat. He sat on the sea, and the size and the urgent interest of the crowd is emphasized by the fact that they are not all here to listen to his word. Probably anchored in shallow water, shallow kind of like the hearts of many listeners. It's an impressive scene. Crowds are always impressive. Seeing a lot of people gathering to hear from one person is always very impressive. But large crowds don't necessarily mean that God's work is being done. Jesus knew the selfish and fickle hearts of sinful people. John 2:23, "Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man for himself knew what was in man." People love a gospel that is good news as they define it. Especially nowadays, it's like there's an internal translator whenever even people are having conversations. Someone says something, and they're like, "So by saying that, you're saying this," and they say something completely different. This is what people do with God's word times infinity. Many didn't come to hear his word, but just to sample it, just to get a taste. You know charcuterie boards? I love charcuterie boards. They're incredible. A lot of people approach the word of God like that. They just say, "I like this part, I like this part. I don't like that part. I'm going to skip the rest," just like I usually skip all the vegetables. I go straight for the cold cuts. No, it's take it or leave it. It's the whole thing. Some people had no spiritual interests whatsoever. Crowds attract crowds. It's very entertaining. Go hear something. You've got something to think about, and you leave. By their repeated hearing Jesus's warning here, by their repeated hearing the word of God, and not believing, and not obeying, the word of God actually hardens them to make it even harder for them to believe. In Mark 4:2, "And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them." Now the word parable in the Septuagint, that's the Greek translation of the Hebrew text. In the Hebrew it is masal, and is a term related to the verb to rule. Therefore, it's talking about authoritative speech. Jesus here is using parables to say, "I have authority to regulate revelation." By using this form of teaching, he is regulating revelation where the same teaching reveals the truth to those who are willing to hear it and obey it, and it conceals the truth from those that do not have spiritually sensitive hearts. It's a system of instruction specifically designed to sift the wheat from the chaff among his hearers because he knew people had mixed motives. And his parables, they're designed to test not intelligence, but the spiritual responsiveness. Matthew 13:34, "All these things Jesus said to the crowds in parables. Indeed, he said nothing to them without a parable. This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet. I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter what has been hidden since the foundation of the world." Psalm 78:1-2, "Give ear, O my people, to my teaching. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings from of old." In verse three of Mark 4, we have the parable. He says, "Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. As he sowed, some seed fell along the path and the birds came and devoured it. Listen, this is verbal. Use your ears." Then he says, "Behold." He says, "Look." He's painting a picture with his words. This is a crucial parable, and it's bracketed with exhortations to listen on the front and on the back. He uses a very familiar agricultural image. Perhaps there was a guy sowing as he is preaching. It was a man, a farmer would take a bag of seed, tie it to his waist, and walk the fields, rhythmically casting the seed, broadcasting the seed. We do devotions with our daughters in the evenings and a scripture study, a little prayer. I call it community group for our family. Same thing we do in community group, we do with our group. I was just zonked yesterday. I was like, "Ah." I was like, "I'm going to re-preach my sermon to you real quick right now." As I'm going through, I said the word broadcast. One of my daughters is like, "What's broadcast mean?" I'm not talking about television. I'm talking about broadcasting. That's what he's doing. He's throwing it indiscriminately, just everywhere. He's got a lot of grain. He knows not all of it is going to produce fruit. Here in the beginning, some falls on a path, a path that was tread probably by villagers, worn down since the last time of the harvest. Birds eat that one. Verse five, "Other seed fell on rocky ground where it did not have much soil and immediately it spraying up since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched. Since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it and it yielded no grain." The landowner didn't cut back the thorns. He didn't uproot them. Or perhaps he just cut them back and they grow up even stronger, and they throttle, and choke the fruit. There's been a progression in the case of the first three seeds. The first never took root at all. The second started but died. And the third survived but bore no fruit. In the end, the first three are of no value to the farmer. What is he after? He's after the grain. He's after the fruit. Verse eight, "And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold, and sixtyfold, and a hundredfold." The yield was calculated by comparing the amount of seed that was sown with the amount of grain that was harvested. The yields of 30, 60, a hundredfold are considered remarkable, especially even in modern times in which yields of sevenfold to elevenfold are typical of countries using traditional cropping systems. The punchline is given verse nine. "He said, 'He who has ears to hear, let him hear.'" Because of the mysteriousness of God's kingdom, a special sort of perception is required to understand, to register its presence. The parable concludes with another exhortation to hear. There is, however, progression between these two uses of the word to hear. In the beginning, he says, "Everybody hear. Everybody listen." Here he says at the end, "Let him who has ears to hear. Let him who has been given the gift of spiritual hearing, make sure you use those ears." Not all can receive Jesus' strange message about the arrival of God's royal power. In the midst of suffering, in the midst of weakness of this fallen world. Not everyone has ears to hear. The only ones who can hear this paradoxical message, rather, are those who have been granted the organ to do so by God. In verse 10, "And when he was alone, those around him with the 12 asked him about the parables. And he said to them, 'To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God. But for those outside, everything is in parables.'" Jesus now retires with his disciples to a private place, giving his intrigued and mystified followers an opportunity to ask about the parable. And to speak about the arrival of the dominion as a mystery or as a secret implies that there is something elusive to it. The parable does not only describe successful seed, but three quarters of its space is devoted to unsuccessful seed. Because of this mysterious hiddenness, one needs eyes of faith in order to discern the presence of God's reign. Why didn't Jesus' brothers believe in him? Why didn't Jesus' mother believe in him? Especially his mother. I've been meditating on this. I think it's because she lived through incredible suffering for years. She's like, "You're the son of God? You're the son of... You're supposed to make everything better. You're supposed to alleviate the pain. You're supposed to remove the suffering and here we have years of suffering. You're saying you're the king of kings?" And When we proclaim that Jesus Christ is king, we understand the difficulty of believing that he's king. When you look around in the world and you're like, "What? Jesus is kingdom. Why are you allowing all of this to happen?" Especially moments of pain. This last Friday, our worship night, I was worshiping through pain because I got the biggest toothache I have ever had in my whole life, consequences of being a son of immigrants. It's mind-numbing. I wish it was mind-numbing. Mind-splitting. It's pain I have not experienced in probably ever. That was Friday, and then last. By the time I called... Long story. I'm going to the dentist on Tuesday, Lord willing. But moments of pain where you're just crippled. You're like, "Lord Jesus, I'm preaching that you're a healer. Could you please heal me?" I'm casting out demons from my... Whatever it is. In the name of Jesus. Moments like that, and it's fallen world, and it's fallen flesh where just pain, and suffering, and just evil and darkness. You're like, "You're the king?" Jesus says, "I'm a king that comes like a seed. I'm a king that comes like a seed. I need to be put in the ground. I need to die in order for that seed to bear fruit. Everything that I'm teaching here is along those lines. It's a mystery. It's truth, but it's shrouded. It's veiled revelation." And we do need the power of the Holy Spirit to see that God truly is King. Martin Buber once put it, "The true victories won in secret sometimes look like defeats." In the limelight, our faith that God is the Lord of history may sometimes appear ludicrous. But there is something secret in history which confirms our faith. This secret is most evident on the cross of Jesus Christ. On the cross of Jesus Christ, you have God who is dying. The author of life is being crucified. The blood from the author of life is dripping down the cross. It seems like the greatest defeat of all defeats. Then, Jesus is buried, and then he rises on the third day, and the greatest defeat turns into the greatest victory, God's victory in apparent defeat. Those outside only see the defeat, and the secret has not been revealed to them. Therefore, what is spoken to them is spoken in parables. "Jesus, why are you using parables?" And this is his answer, Mark 4:12, "So that they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven." God does not intend for everyone to receive his word, so it should come as no surprise that some people reject it. It is not God's intention that Jesus' parables should enlighten the outsiders. Instead, it should blind them, close off their understanding, prevent them from attaining repentance and forgiveness. There is deliberate divine intention that some people misunderstand and remain impenitent. It's part of God's justice upon them. We see this in this text that's quoted by Jesus in the original context in Isaiah 6. Isaiah 6 begins with the revelation of God enthroned in awesome splendor, the king of the cosmos. Isaiah sees this. Isaiah is in the throne room of God. He sees the seraphim, the angels of God, serenading God, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." Isaiah, realizing he's in the presence of God, he says, "Woe, that's God. Woe is me. Who am I, a man of unclean lips that lives amongst the people of unclean lips." God then sanctifies, forgives him of his sin. Then, God says, "Who shall we send? Who will go for us to preach the word?" Isaiah says, "Here am I. Send me." Then, the following verses, we see one of the deepest mysteries in all of scripture, that God sovereignly grants salvation to his elect, and sinners are fully responsible for their persistence in sin and their ultimate condemnation. Isaiah 6:9, "And he said, 'Go, and say to this people, 'Keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing, but do not perceive.' Make the heart of this people dull and their ears heavy and blind their eyes, lest they see what their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts and turn and be healed." How did Isaiah obey the strange commission? It wasn't by preaching obscure expressions or complex reasoning. No. You read his preaching. It's very plain, very systematic, very reason. People's reaction was they scoffed at him, and they scoffed at the message. When we read this and we realize to know the truth of the gospel, to believe the word of God is a gift. Why are you a Christian to dear saint? Why are you a follower of Jesus Christ? The only answer that is true is that Jesus saved me. God saved me. God changed my heart. God revealed the truth to me. It wasn't because of my ingenuity, it wasn't because of my studies, it wasn't because of my own reading. No, it was God saved me. God chose to reveal the secret to me. So what does that do to our pride? Absolutely decimates it. We have no pride. We're on our knees before the throne and we say, "Lord Jesus, thank you for revealing the truth." To me, the same word that comes as revelation to the insiders comes as blinding to the outsiders. The difference between the two groups is not that one gets parables while the other does not. No, it's one gets parables in order to understand and the other group gets parables in order to harden them in disbelief. Veiled revelation, just like God in Christ is both revealed and veiled. His siblings saw him and they're like, "You look normal. You look like us." Because his mother saw him like, "Can you unveil, please?" It's veiled revelation. I have sisters. One of my sisters, she's a tremendous gift giver, even better gift wrapper. Whenever you see her gifts wraps and the gift bags, I'm like, "Oh, this is going to be good." then you get the present. It's pretty good. Then, I have another sister who caress nothing for wrapping. She wraps all her presents in Trader Joe's bags. You get it, you're like, "What is this, Amazon? What's going on?" You know it's going to be good though because it's coming from her. Don't let the packaging keep you from opening the package. Don't let the veil keep you from unveiling the veil and seeing the revelation. I saw a video of this guy walking around offering people either $20 or an ounce of gold, gold coin. Everyone took the $20. I'm watching. I'm like, "No, don't take the $20." Then, he revealed. Someone took the 20 bucks, and he's like, "How much is an ounce of gold?" He's like, "I don't know, like $1,200 give or take." Everyone's like, "Is it too late?" A lot of people, they read the word of God, they don't have taste buds that value. There's taste buds of your soul. Their soul don't value that this is the word of God that leads to eternal life. We're not just talking about money or this... You can't quantify the value that you can get from the word of God. It's veiled, but it's veiled for a purpose, a purpose of those with humble hearts to go and to keep asking, to keep seeking, just like his disciples. The crowds all left. They didn't understand. The disciples, they come to Jesus like, "We don't get it." And Jesus gives them even more revelation. God has hidden his mysteries from the wise and discerning, but he does so only in order to accentuate the miracle that God has now revealed them to babies. The parables serve two functions, first to reveal truth to those who are spiritually responsive and, second, to conceal truth from those who are spiritually superficial or scoffing. One commentator says, "Parables are a mine of information to those who are in earnest, but they are a judgment on the casual and careless." Verse 13, "And he said to them, 'Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?'" Here, the word understand in the English, in both sentences, it's the same word, but in the Greek it's two different words, oidate and gnosesthe. The first one is to know as if by intuition. That intuition is a gift from God. You can only have the intuition, spiritual perception, intuition if you're gifted it. And the second one is knowledge that comes with experience. He's saying, "Do you understand? Do you have the intuition? If not, I'm going to give it to you." Then, that intuition must deepen with the experience, and only God can give you spiritual intuition which deepens with experience. Here, Jesus makes the cruciality of this parable clear. He's saying, "This parable is the key that actually unlocks the rest of the parables and the rest of the scriptures. To one who already has something more will be given some spiritual insight into the meaning of one parable will lead to further insight into the meaning of the other parables. And failure to understand this one continues to mystify and further and further brings people into the fog of disbelief." As in all spiritual matters, we either hear or we do not hear. And to see the spiritual truth, to hear is proof that we have received illumination from the Holy Spirit. Only the Holy Spirit can give us eyes to see spiritual truth. Why? Because we're blind by nature, blinded by sin. The more of God's revealed truth we assimilate, the more our capacity for assimilating truth grows. And further spiritual perception of God's truth can be perilous. It only condemns us unless we act upon it. Increased knowledge merely brings increased responsibility. In Luke 12:47, Christ says, "And that servant who knew his master's will but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating. But the one who did not know and did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required. And from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more." This brings us to point three. Hear the word, and accept it, and bear fruit. In verse 14, Jesus begins expounding his own parable. The sower sows the word. The seed here is a powerful symbol of the word of God that has power to sprout eternal life, bring forth eternal life. James 1:8, "Of his own will, he brought us forth by the word of truth that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures." 1 Peter 1:23, "Since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God, for all flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever. And this word is the good news that was preached to you." Four soils symbolize four hearts. The first is the hard heart. The second is the shallow heart. The third is the over-cluttered heart. And the fourth is the good heart. How does the seed, which is the word of God, release power? By going deep. What does the depth depend on? The condition of the soil. The soil represents the condition of each listener's heart. Are you listening with your heart? Are you listening with a soft heart? And how do you know that God's power has entered your life? Well, he's no longer a theory. He's no longer an abstraction. He's no longer a thing. He's no longer just a religious category. No, he becomes the priority. He becomes the center. He becomes number one in the hierarchy, in the org chart of your life. Everything revolves around him. The whole of the Christian life is one of continual and progressive response to the fresh spiritual revelation we get from God's word. Verse 15, "And these are the ones along the path where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them." This word falls on deaf ears. Perhaps the heart has been hardened with distractions. Perhaps not necessarily anything bad, just something that takes your mind off of God. It's like you're reading the Bible, and then you read a chapter, you read a second chapter. And if someone stopped you there and they said, "What did you just read?" You're like, "I have no idea. I have no clue." Or you're listening to the sermon, and you're like, "I've already heard this before." all of a sudden you think about how Mac Jones is terrible. The Pats are awful. And Belichick-Brady, it was clearly Brady, not Belichick. All of a sudden, you're not thinking about the word at all. And you know that's all true. Or you're like, "You know what? That's interesting." There's a lot of intellectuals in the city, and you're like, "This is very interesting. I'll just think about." But then you never think about, "Well, how should I respond? What does God want me to do with this word?" That's how you take it in. You receive it so that it actually changes you. The words that we read in holy scripture, in the holy Bible, these aren't just human words. This is the word of God, and it gives us power for life, and it gives us power to find eternal life. Deuteronomy 32:47, "For it is no empty word for you, but your very life, and by this word you shall live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess." This is Satan tempts Jesus, and Jesus says, "Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God." There he's quoting the book of Deuteronomy. Every single one of those words is from the mouth of God himself. Or maybe you hear a sermon or you read scripture and you think about the implications of this for someone else, but never for yourself. Distractions send more people to hell than even doubt. Satan, what does he do? Satan's, by the way, not a figure of speech. Jesus knows who Satan is. He's taking Satan head on in the desert. There is a real spiritual battle raging for the souls of men and women, and Satan hardens people's hearts by the traffic of world philosophies. This is one of the main things that hardens people's hearts. Just years and years of indoctrination, of demonic ideologies, and it hardens your heart to the point where the word just bounces off. That's all Satan's work. Verse 16, "And these are the ones sown on rocky ground, the ones who when they hear the word immediately receive it with joy. And they have no root in themselves but endure for a while. Then when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away." The seed falls on a thin layer of soil over hard limestone or other stone. This is people who are initially moved. They hear the word, and they make a decision that's short-lived enthusiasm. Perhaps it's very impulsive, but not always are they responding to God. Perhaps they're responding to a feeling. And as soon as that feeling is gone, so is the faith. What's proof of our faith? It's not the intensity in the beginning, but endurance to the end. Once saved, always persevering. The word for fall away here comes from the word skandalon or scandalized. Refers to someone who views the message of the cross as an offense, as a barrier to belief. And to fall away is to trip over an obstacle. Jesus points out in these cases the shame of persecution is greater than the person's embrace of the message, and they stumble over the message in times of trouble, when things get hard. Here, dear Christian, dear saint, we have to resolve. We have to make a resolution. No matter the persecution, no matter the trials or the challenges, I will stand strong on the word of God no matter what. God help me. Verse 18, "And others are the ones who are sown among thorns. They're those who hear the word. But the caress of the world, and deceitfulness of riches, and the desires of other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful." Here we have the case of a divided heart, a heart infested with irreconcilable loyalties. Some of you won't follow through on obedience to God's word because the caress of the world begin to choke it out. It's not a conscious decision to reject God, but little by little God's word gets crowded out by other things. And all of a sudden, God's not that important. Reading scripture doesn't become that important, doesn't become... It's no longer imperative. Little by little, we lose our love for the Lord. Jesus said, "No one can serve two masters." And 1 John 2:15 says, "Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him." This soil pictures those who get so encumbered with the basic enticements of this world that they produce no fruit. Again, the seed fails to accomplish its purpose. Think of someone like Judas, Judas who heard all of Jesus' sermons. He saw all of Jesus' miracles. Why, he even performed some miracles himself in Jesus' name. How could this man, how could it possibly be that this man would turn away from the son of God? And how could theologians, describes in the Pharisees, who knew God's words supposedly, and saw Jesus drive out demons, and do miracles, and heal the sick, and they call him an agent of Satan? Well, why didn't they believe? Because no one expected that the king of kings, the Messiah, the God of the universe would come like this. When the king came, all of Israel was to fall into his train and worship him, or so they thought. But the kingdom didn't come that way, not the first time. It comes the way of the seed. In John 12:23, "Jesus answered them, 'The hour has come for the son of man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit.'" If you think about planting a seed, it's such a tender thing. It's so gentle. You take some soil, you take a pot of soil, and you place it gently in, you water it, you care for it. Jesus said, "This is how the kingdom enters your life." Jesus, in the same way that your body entered the ground, you are the living seed of God, the living word of God. You died in order to be raised again. Why? To give us life, to give us new life. In Mark 4:20, "But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who bear the word, hear the word, and accept and bear fruit thirtyfold, and sixtyfold, and a hundredfold." 30, 60, a hundred shows that different disciples have different levels of productivity, just like different people have different talents that the Lord gives one talent to some, two talents to another, five to another. But they're all productive. They do the best that they can with what they have. When the word reaches a prepared heart, it flourishes, and the seed does what the seed is supposed to do to, bear fruit. I urge you to aspire to greater fruitfulness. Where are you in this category? First of all, which soils are you? I urge all of you to join me in being number four. Altogether, all of us number four, please. Receptive to God's word, humble under the authorial intent. Focus on exegesis, taking the truth out of text, instead of eisegesis, infusing it into the text. But the whole goal is to be as productive as possible. By productivity, yes, I mean fruit of the Holy Spirit and being transported, be more and more Christ-like, but I also mean converts. And this is what this text is, that one seed led to 30 seeds, or 60 seeds, or a hundred seeds. In the same way that someone shared the gospel with you, you are to share the gospel with others. How many people have entered the kingdom of God thanks be to your witness? Now, let's aspire to do more. Whenever I see categories like this, I was like, "I want to be in the hundred mark. I want to be in the hundred mark." How do we get there? Lord, I come to your word with a humble and contrite heart. Lord, plant your seed in my heart. And Lord, bring the growth. When you have a receptive heart, I'm like, "God just does incredible things." I'm walking to church today, and some lady's walking her dog. She comes up to me. In Boston, no one really comes up to you. I'm like, "Oh, this is strange." She's like, "Do you know where the dog park is?" Oh, do I know. Because I have a daughter that wants a dog, and we won't get her dog, so we spent a lot of time in the dog park. So I told her. I gave her directions, the dog park. Then, I'm preaching, and I see her come in, like the first service. Then after the service, all of a sudden, she's weeping. She's like, "God brought us together." I'm like, "Yes, he did. You need to repent and trust in Jesus Christ." She's weeping and praying. When you say, "Lord, this is my posture of heart. Lord, use me. Lord, plant your word into my heart. Have a go deep. Lord, I want to be used by you so that other people meet you, lots of people, 30, 60, a hundredfold, even more." The word is not only the message about the kingdom, but also God's instrument for liberating humanity, and thus bringing in the kingdom. The people who really hear the word, listen to it continually, allow themselves to be broken apart and put together again by the word, as they're growing, plant shatters and transforms the earth in which it is sown. It no longer occupies a secondary place in their lives but has moved to the very center of existence. The word of God promises... When we seek him with all of our heart, we will find him. Jeremiah 29:13, "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 'I will be found by you,' declares the Lord. 'And I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I've driven you,' declares the Lord, 'and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile." Dear friend, if today you're not sure that you are a believer, that you are saved from your sins, from the condemnation that your sins deserve, today, in your heart of hearts, cry out to the God of universe, "Lord Jesus, have mercy on my soul. Lord Jesus, give me grace. Forgive me of my sin. Plant the seed of the gospel in my heart," and you shall be saved. Then, follow Jesus Christ. Study the good book, and do what it says. For us as believers, if there is anything in your life, in your heart that's choking out the productivity of the word, if there are any distractions today, remove them, and ask the Lord to cultivate a good soil in your heart. Amen. Let us pray. Lord God, we thank you for this time in the word. What a rich word this is. I pray that you make us not just hearers of the word but doers of it by your grace and by the power of the Holy Spirit. Lord, everything that you call us to do, we cannot do perfectly. But still, you say, "Be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect." So Lord, we aspire to do your will perfectly. We thank you for the grace when we fall and don't do it perfectly. I pray, Lord, continue to tenderize our hearts by the power of the Spirit so that we can be evermore fruitful as individuals, as families, and as a church. We pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. 

Mosaic Boston
The Unforgivable Sin

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 15, 2023 43:49


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Tyler. I'm the youth and hospitality director here at Mosaic Boston, and whenever I get the opportunity to preach, I always say it is my honor and my privilege to be able to deliver God's word to all of us today. We will be continuing our sermon series through the book of Mark. We'll be in Mark 3:20-35, and the sermon series title is Kingdom Come. And we're going to be looking at what does life in the kingdom of God look like? What does that look like here? But before we get into the text in today's sermon, I have something to say. "I will never forgive you." Harsh words to hear on a Sunday morning. First service was even more appalled. No, I hope you know that I'm not saying that seriously. You have not offended me. You have not done anything to cause me to hold forgiveness from you. But I want to know what would it take for us to say that to someone? What would someone have to do to us to say to them, "I will never forgive you." Maybe it's something as simple as, "If you lie to me, you break my trust, there's no way I could ever trust you again. I will never forgive you." Maybe say, "Oh, I'm a little bit more holy than that. They would have to cheat on me in a relationship. That I couldn't forgive." And then maybe someone says, "I'm a little bit more holy than that they would have to murder someone I love in order for me not to forgive them." Maybe it's things going on in the world and you say, "I could never forgive that." Maybe you're here and you're saying this is church on a Sunday. This is a trap. I know the right Sunday school answer is, "I'll forgive everyone of everything." I would ask you, does your heart really truly reflect that? If we're honest with ourselves, is there anything that we say and believe someone can do to us and we will never forgive them? Now, what if I told you that there is something that God Himself says he will never forgive? Now, this is the harsh reality of the text that we will be in is what we call the unforgivable sin that Jesus says is an eternal sin that will never be forgiven. We're going to get to that. But before we do, I want to point out something that's really important about it. It's a sin against God, not a sin against man. So what does that mean? It means that we are not able to have a sin that we withhold forgiveness from others, right? That's not our job. God is the one who forgives and declares that this one sin is unforgivable. So with that sombering mood to set the tone for our service today, will you pray with me over the reading and preaching of God's word. Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you that you are a God who forgives. You are a God of mercy and grace, but you do not take sin lightly. Lord, help us to not take our sins against you lightly. Convict us where we need to be convicted. Help us to turn and run to you in repentance, knowing that you do desire to forgive and you are willing, ready, and able to forgive. Help us to trust you more. Lord, use this time. Encourage your church, speak through me. Speak through your word and your scriptures to encourage and strengthen your church and convict us where we need to be convicted. In Jesus' name, amen. So it is going to be a hard text today and there's a lot going on in it, but I do want to say I believe it is an encouragement to us. I have been greatly encouraged in my studies of this text this week, and I hope it's an encouragement to you. And so to be able to frame up our time, we're going to be spending in three sections. I hesitate to call them points. They are pretty distinct thoughts, but at the end we'll wrap it all together. We'll see how it's all connected. But our three ideas for the sermon are one, liar or lunatic, liar, or Lord, we'll get to that. Number two, the unforgivable sin. And number three, right relationship with Jesus Christ. So that's how we'll be framing our time today. And this is what we see in our text in Mark 3:20-35. If you have your Bibles, you could open it, you could find it on your phone or you could follow along on the screens behind me. God's word says, "Then He, Jesus, went home and the crowd gathered again so that they could not even eat. And when His family heard it, they went out to seize Him. For they were saying, 'He is out of His mind.' And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying He's possessed by Beelzebul and by the prince of demons, he cast out demons and he called them to him and said to them in parables, 'how can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, the house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand but is coming to an end. But no one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man, then indeed he may plunder his house. Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven. The children of man and whatever blasphemes they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness but is guilty of an eternal sin,' for they had said he has an unclean spirit." "And His mother and His brothers came and standing outside, they sent to Him and called Him and a crowd was sitting around Him and they said to Him, 'your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.' And He answered them, 'who are my mother and my brothers?' And looking about at those who sat around Him, He said, 'here are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother'." This is the reading of God's holy, inherent, authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Point number one, the fun one, lunatic, liar or Lord? This is a phrase that was coined by C.S. Lewis in terms of these are the options that he presented that we can believe about Jesus and who He is. You can either believe that He is a lunatic, a man out of His mind claiming to be God. Think about it. Where in society today do we see people who claim to be God? Most of the times it's in some sort of institution because society has said, "You're not in your right mind." Second is liar, that Jesus claimed to be God. And so He willfully led people onto believe that even though He knew he wasn't and He was lying to lead people to follow Him. Or thirdly, that He is Lord, that He is who He says He is. And this idea was brought up by C.S. Lewis to combat the idea of Jesus as a good moral teacher and philosopher. This is something that I think is still prevalent in our society today. We're okay with saying that Jesus brought good ideas that help society, that Jesus is a good man with moral teachings, and so it was good for society that He came. But C.S. Lewis argues we cannot hold that position because good people do not claim to be God. If He willingly knew that He was God, then He was who He says He was. And if He willingly knew He wasn't and lied about it, then He's a liar and He is not a good person. So these are the only three options that C.S. Lewis presents. And many scholars believe that this text in Mark is where C.S. Lewis gets this idea from because we see all of these options here and we're going to go through them. The first option is lunatic. And this is the very first two verses, verse 20 and 21. "Then He, Jesus, went home and the crowd gathered again so that they could not even eat. And when His family heard it, they went out to seize Him, for they were saying, 'He is out of His mind'." His family, His mother and His siblings said about Him, "You're out of your mind. You're crazy." This is what we mean when we say lunatic. And for the context of where this chapter falls, in the previous sections, Jesus has been healing people and been casting out demons. And while He's doing that, more and more people are coming to Him, bringing their sick, bringing those that are demon oppressed for Jesus to heal them. And so such a great crowd comes around Jesus that He goes down by the sea, He goes, "I can't stay in the city anymore. It's too much chaos. We're going down by the sea." And then the crowd got greater and greater and greater to the point that Jesus was like, "I need to retreat up in the mountains. I'm taking my disciples. We're going up to the mountains to be with the Lord and then we'll come back eventually." So Jesus is up in the mountains and then verse 20, "Then He went home." So He's coming down from His retreat in the mountains to home, but where is home? Home is in Capernaum. It is most likely Peter's house, not His own home. Why is this what we believe? Is because Peter's house is the only house mentioned in the book of Mark and His family had to go out to find Him. So it's not His parents' house, 'cause they wouldn't have to go anywhere to find Jesus. So it's not His parents' house. It's most likely Peter's house. So He comes down from this retreat and everyone's like, "He's back. Let's go find Him." So the crowd gathers again and they're swarming Him with so many people that need healing and casting out of demons that they don't have time to even eat. They can't gather anything, they're just working the miracles of God by the power of the Holy Spirit. And His family sees it and they're like, what kind of person draws such a crowd? What kind of person spends so much time with the sick and demon oppressed? He must be out of His mind. He must be crazy. So that's the first option that we see people believing about who Jesus is. And the second is that He's a liar. And this is the next verse, verse 22. "And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, 'He is possessed by Beelzebub and by the prince of demons, he casts out demons'." And so the scribes come down to see what's going on with this great gathering and they find Jesus casting out demons and they're saying, no, no, He's saying He's doing it by the power of God. He has claimed to be God the Messiah, but no, He's a liar. He's doing it by the power of Satan instead. That's a bold, bold claim. Now the purpose of the book of Mark is to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jesus is the one true messiah, that He is God come to earth and Mark has written this book to convince the Jewish readers of his day that Jesus is the Messiah and its purpose is the same for us today. Yes, I agree with C.S. Lewis in a lot of ways that these are the only three options. We cannot say Jesus is a good person, but the Gospel's point is there's only one option. You could say that He looks like a lunatic. You can accuse Him of being a liar, but those do not hold any weight. He is clearly who He says He is. He is Lord. And Jesus proves that point in the following verses. This is Mark 3:23-26. "Jesus then calls the scribes to Him and said to them in parables, 'how can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, the kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand but is coming to an end'." Jesus defeats the arguments of lunatic or liar by these few sentences and appeals to the scribe's natural understanding of the world. Logically, He says, can Satan cast out Satan? How is that even possible? Think about it this way, if that doesn't make sense to you, how can a kingdom divided against itself stand? Think about a kingdom that's at constant civil war with one another. How is that kingdom going to stand until one of the side cedes to the other and there is unity between the two. It can't. Constant battle will eventually destroy them. So a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand. And if you're saying Jesus is casting out demons by the power of demons that makes no sense. It would be a kingdom divided. But maybe the kingdom analogy doesn't work as well. So what about a household? It says a house divided against itself cannot stand? Unfortunately, this is one that many of us are much more familiar with in our day and age is the broken household. How can a broken household stand? How can a household where mother and father are constantly pitted against one another, arguing without any unity, without any forgiveness, how can that household stand? And most of the times it does not.And Jesus is appealing to their logic. He's appealing to their reason, He's appealing to their natural sense of saying, what you are accusing me of makes no sense. And by doing this, He defeats both arguments of lunatic and liar. The argument that He's making is against Him being a liar. He is saying, "I'm not lying. What you're saying, it doesn't make any sense." And He proves not to be a lunatic because He's in His right mind and He's able to out reason the scribes. Well, the question is who are the scribes? Scribes aren't just your average, everyday Joe Schmo on the block who likes to pick fights and argue? No, the scribes were religious lawyers. So they were the ones who were charged with interpreting the laws of scripture and giving it to the synagogues, that's the temple to the Jewish people, for what to follow. It was their job essentially to be the most logical and reasonable. And Jesus outlogiced and reasoned them. And He is saying, I cannot be a lunatic. I'm in my right mind. I'm more reasonable than the most reasonable people in our society. And I'm not a liar. I just proved that in the argument. So what else is there? Is Jesus who He says He is? Is He Lord? Is He God? And this is verse 27. Verse 27 is actually a statement, a claim of divinity by Jesus. Jesus says, "But no one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man. Then indeed, he may plunder his house." The strong man here is not Jesus. The strong man here is Satan. The argument is if you're casting out demons by the power of Satan, that's what they're accusing Him of, He's saying, how can I do that unless I first bind the strong man, bind Satan, then I can cast out the demons, then I could go in and plunder his house. So what Jesus is saying is He's not the strong man, but in order to be able to bind a strong man, what do you need to be? You need to be stronger. Jesus is saying, I am the stronger man. I am the strongest man. And that is where the statement takes place in terms of Jesus claiming His divine authority that he is God, because in the spiritual realm, everyone at this time understood that the most powerful spiritual being was Satan, apart from one, that there was only one who was greater in power and might than Satan, and that was God Himself. So by Jesus saying, I am stronger than Satan, He is saying to the people and they well understood it, I am God. Jesus doesn't just defeat plausible arguments about who He might be. He declares boldly that He is God. And as we are going to transition into this topic of the unforgivable sin, the first thing that we need to talk about before we get anywhere near there is who do you say Jesus is? Who is Jesus to you? I want to put forward this to you and argue and plead with you to hear that Jesus is who He says He is. He is Lord, whatever cultural or societal or prejudices or ideas about Jesus that you might have, I urge you to consider is He who He says He is? And I promise you that He is God, He is Lord, and He is savior. And that is the setup for this section on the unforgivable sin. And this is verses 28 through 30 where Jesus says, "'Truly I say to you, all sins will be forgiven. The children of man and whatever blasphemes they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness but is guilty of an eternal sin,' for they had said He has an unclean spirit." So before we get to the awkwardness of the unforgivable sin, we have to understand that this is ultimately about forgiveness as a whole and it's forgiveness by God. This is what I mentioned in the beginning, and John Piper wrote an article on his website about these verses and he says this, "First, the forgiveness in view is God's forgiveness. The sweetest news for a sinner is that God has forgiven him, that God no longer holds his sins against him. But the worst news in the world is that God will never forgive you. God is the one to reckon with. What men think about our sin is relatively unimportant. What God thinks is infinitely important." So we're talking about forgiveness from God and what does Jesus say? The first part that he says, "All sins will be forgiven the children of man and whatever blasphemes they utter." I want to pause there because oftentimes this gets lost by the following section of the unforgivable sin, we can't even hear these words of Jesus. Do you feel the weight of these words, all sins will be forgiven the children of man? I kind of say, do you feel the weight of that facetiously because it's light, it's freeing, it's something that sets us free, that we know with certainty God is able and willing to forgive us of anything we do. Do we run to Him in forgiveness? And not only is He willing, He is able, He's able, He's powerful enough to do it. This is my favorite part of that strong man section that I skimmed over a little bit. But He says He's going to go in and plunder the goods once He binds the strong man. So Jesus is strong enough to bind the strong man and plunder his goods. What is pluming goods? It's taking the goods from, say, someone's house and then bringing them into your own and saying, These are now mine, making them your own. Well, what are the goods of the kingdom of Satan and what are the goods of the kingdom of God? What are the most valuable possessions of them? It's people, it's you, it's me. It's souls. It's eternal beings that Jesus doesn't just sit back and say, "I could forgive you if you want," but he says, I am actively going in and I am plundering. I am setting free those who are in captivity to the kingdom of Satan, those who are in captivity to sin and to death and to Satan. Jesus comes in and plunders us. He sets us free from that and brings us into His kingdom and says, "You are mine now." That is the freedom of this verse and it's really important that we get it before we get to the blaspheme of the Holy Spirit because we like to hold onto the like, what about the but? But the main thing here is that there is ultimate complete forgiveness from God for all sins. Psalm 130:10-13 says this, "He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His steadfast love towards those who fear Him. As far as the east is from the west, so far does He remove our transgressions from us. As a father shows compassion to His children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear Him." God's love is so great. It is higher than the heavens. It is so great that He's willing and able and powerful enough to forgive us of all of our sins if we just turn to Him and repent. And the incredible thing about this is even if you called Jesus a lunatic or a liar or anything else, any other words under the sun, Jesus is willing to forgive you of that. Many of us at one point in time, maybe were angry with God, maybe said some things we didn't necessarily mean or maybe we did mean and don't want to admit that we meant it. But if we have called Jesus a lunatic or a liar, God is willing to forgive. If we have hated Jesus and even hated some of His teachings and said, "I don't like what the Bible says about X, Y, or Z," God is willing to forgive. Even if we say, "I hate God's people, I hate Christians, I hate the church," even if we have ever said any of those things, God is still willing and ready and able to forgive. So if you're here today and you're not a Christian, I want to encourage you, God is looking to forgive you. He is willing and ready to forgive. Nothing that you have done is so grievous that He will not forgive. And if you're here today and you're a Christian, what this means is that we can joyfully repent when we have the conviction of sin because we know that He wants to forgive us. So then you're all wondering, we're all wondering what about the exception to the rule? What about this blasphemy of the Holy Spirit? Where does this come in? I have always said that blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is equating the works of the Holy Spirit to the work of Satan or to the demonic, and that is true in a lot of senses. I think it's a clear example of how we see this sin take place and it's the example we see here in our text, but I think it's a little bit more nuanced and the heart of the sin is a little bit more nuanced. And John Piper, in his article on these verses, again, the same article says this, "What then is it? The unforgivable sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is an act of resistance which belittles the Holy Spirit so grievously that He withdraws forever His convicting power so that we are never able to repent and be forgiven." I'm going to say that again. "Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is an act of resistance, which belittles the Holy Spirit so grievously that He withdraws forever with His convicting power so that we are never able to repent and be forgiven." This is important because what it means is there is no sin so grievous that God holds a grudge and won't forgive. I think the initial thought-provoking question of what would someone have to do for us to say to them, "I will never forgive you?" Our mind immediately goes to how bad of a sin is that thing going to be? And the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is not unforgivable because it's so bad that God is incapable of forgiving. No, and it's not that. It just is this one thing God said, "I guess I can't forgive it, so I'm stuck in this and I can't forgive." No, it's a belittling of the Holy Spirit so grievously that the Holy Spirit who convicts us of sin, we push away, we say we want nothing to do with you. We remove the ability of God's convicting power from our lives so that way we are never caused to repent and therefore cannot be forgiven. This is where the word that the scribes use to describe the spirit that they believe God is or that Jesus is working through is so important. It's the word Beelzebul. Beelzebul. It's a actual nickname for Satan. Not a good nickname. But the title for Satan that they're kind of doing a play on is Beelzebub. The name Beelzebub means Prince of Demons or Ruler of Demons. And so that was kind of the formal name that Satan was called by. But man, the Jewish people and the scribes, they had a great sense of humor. We think that we're the greatest memers of all time, memers, look at me, I don't use memes ever, but we think that we have the best memes of all time, but it's just that we have the internet to spread it more. But the Jewish people are like, yeah, Beelzebub, we'll call them Beelzebul. Well, what does that mean? Beelzebul, by changing one letter, they changed the name from Ruler of Demons to Lord of the Flies or Lord of Dung. In a lot of ways this was a relatively good thing. Satan is not Lord of anything good, all that he rules leads to death, destruction, despair, you could say dung. The issue is the scribe said the clear working of the Holy Spirit is as dung to us. Those are harsh words to say about the Holy Spirit. It's a harsh thing to say about the Spirit of God. And Jesus's warning against the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. He uses the words very specifically saying, Holy Spirit. This is something that I learned. I don't know when, but I didn't know growing up, and I don't know if you guys know this, but the Holy Spirit is not His formal name. It's not like Holy, His first name, Spirit, His last name. It's a descriptive word many times throughout scripture, Jesus just calls Him Spirit or the Spirit of God. Holy is not a requirement to be attached, but it's an identifier. And Jesus uses this very intentionally here to counteract the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which is saying the spirit you are working with is dung to us. And He says, no, no, I'm going to tell you who the spirit is. It's the Holy Spirit, it's the anointed one, it's the cleanse, holy, clean spirit of God. That is the power by which Jesus is working His miracles here. So the question then becomes, okay, that's a whole lot of theological talk. What does it mean for us today? First, very simply, honor the Holy Spirit. Bestow honor upon whom honor is due. And this is one of the beautiful things that I love about the Trinity, is that each person of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit bestows honor on the others. The Father bestows honor upon the Son and upon the Spirit, the Son bestows honor upon the Spirit and upon the Father, and the Spirit bestows honor upon the Son and on the Father. And I think oftentimes we neglect to honor the spirit because of two temptations. One is that we are very academic, intellectually based people. And so spiritual things tend to be harder to understand. They don't come as naturally to understand. And so we kind of shy away from it a little bit. Or the other temptation is to over exalt the giftings of the spirit, right? We say the Spirit enables people to do good things, to prophesy, to teach, to do all these wonderful good things. So we want the gifts more than we want the Spirit. And so, one thing that we are called to do in terms of avoiding and getting as far away from the sin of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is to just honor the Spirit, recognize His working in our lives, recognize the conviction of sin when we feel it, recognize the gift of comfort and peace in hard times as a gift of the Holy Spirit, that God is with us, He is not leaving us. That when we are able to do work for the glory of God, that it is a blessing of the Holy Spirit and praise God for His spirit and ask for more. Say, Lord, I need more help. Lord, give me more of your spirit. Help me to live for you. And the second thing, and I think the most directly relatable to this text that we are called to do in terms of avoiding the sin of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, is if you feel conviction of sin, don't take it for granted. Don't take it for granted. If you feel conviction of sin, don't say, "Yeah, but it's not that bad of a sin. I know I got to work on it, but I'll deal with it later." Don't say, "No, I don't believe that's a sin. God, I think I'm okay. I'm going to hold onto this for now." When you feel conviction of sin, repent quickly. And while you are able and ready to forgive or ready to be forgiven and to repent, remembering again that God is willing, all sins, He says, will be forgiven the children of man and whatever blasphemes they utter. So God wants to forgive when you feel that conviction go and repent. And I think one of the lies of Satan is that when we feel conviction, we associate it with guilt and with shame. What I want to tell you today is recognize that the conviction is a gift from God of the Holy Spirit. It's a good thing. It is something to rejoice over when we feel conviction and not be ashamed about because we could say, hey, the Holy Spirit's still with me. God is with me. He's talking to me. He's correcting me, He's guiding me. It's a blessing. It is a good thing to feel conviction of the Holy Spirit. And the other side of this is the more that we reject that conviction, the easier it becomes to continually reject that conviction of sin. In a separate account of Jesus warning His disciples about this sin a second time, in Luke chapter 12, it immediately follows the passage on the warning of the leaven of the Pharisees. Well, what is that? Jesus is warning His disciples about what He calls the leaven of the Pharisees, which is a little bit of yeast, a little bit of leaven that gets into a loaf of dough will eventually take over the whole thing and the whole thing will be infected with this leaven. And so beware of the little things, beware of the little sins that continually perpetuate within you and ultimately lead to something that is much greater than what it set out and started out as. And I believe that this connection is very intentional with the blaspheme of the Holy Spirit because the more we continually reject the conviction of the Holy Spirit, the more we're going to do it, the more we're going to say, "No, that's okay. I'm good. No, I don't need to repent. I'm fine. I'm good." Until we get to the point where we're like the scribes who stand above the law, they say, we're the ones given the right to interpret the law. We're the ones given authority to say the do's and don'ts of the scriptures. I don't need to repent 'cause I know what I'm talking about. I know what I'm doing. Beware in the leaven of the Pharisees, beware the rejection of the conviction of the Holy Spirit. And the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is not a one-time event. It's not something that you say once and it's like, "Oh, sorry, you're done. No hope." It actually comes out of the state of our hearts. It reveals the state of our hearts. And in Matthew chapter 12, it's the same story of Jesus warning, the scribes and the Pharisees about the sin of the blaspheme of the Holy Spirit. But He doesn't stop there. He continues. Matthew continues the account of what Jesus says to them. And in Matthew 12:33, it says, "Either make the tree good and it's fruit good or make the tree bad and it's fruit bad, for the tree is known by its fruit. You brood of vipers. How can you speak good when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks." I'm going to stop there for now. But for out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Jesus knew the heart of the scribes and of the Pharisees. This wasn't just something that they were wrong about. This wasn't just them not believing in Jesus. Within their hearts, they had built up this resentment towards the working of God. Why? Because they had a nice job. They had a good living. They were high in society and anything that challenged that, they wanted nothing to do with. And so they put themselves over God and over His scriptures rather than submitting to it and trusting the conviction of the Holy Spirit to the point that they have belittled the spirit so much that they couldn't hear that conviction any longer. What I want to say to you is I do believe that this text is an encouragement. I know you might be like, "How? Why?" It's an encouragement because again, we cannot forget God's willingness and readiness to forgive us when we repent. And also it's an encouragement because if you have ever worried, maybe you're worried now, have I done that? Have I committed the sin? Oh, maybe I'm headed down that way. That's a good sign because it means that God is convicting you, right? It means that the Holy Spirit is still with you, is still active, is still moving in your life. Many people when they talk about this sin, they'll say, if you ever fear that you have committed it's proof that you haven't. And I agree because that is the conviction of the Holy Spirit within you saying that you're not in a right place with God. And then whatever you need to do to get in a right place with God, do and repent of whatever sins the Holy Spirit is convicting you of. So Jesus proves that He is Lord, which proves that the working He is doing is by the power of the Holy Spirit and He exalts and lifts up the Holy Spirit, calls us to repentance. So now what brings us into right relationship with Jesus Christ. This is the last section of our text which connects back to the very beginning of this text. In verse 31 it says, "And His mother and His brothers came and standing outside, they sent to Him and called Him and a crowd was sitting around Him and they said to Him, 'your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.' And He answered them, 'who are my mother and my brothers?' And looking about at those who sat around Him, He said, 'here are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother'." Remember back in verse 20, it said that Jesus's family was going out to seize Him. In other words, seize is take by force. So they go and they finally get there. They get to where He is, and the crowd's still there and they're looking around at the crowd and they're like, maybe it's not the best idea to take Him by force. We might cause an uprising. Let's just tell people, "Hey, we're here to see Jesus. Can you tell Him His mother and His brothers are here?" So the crowd is like, "Jesus, your family's here. Go see them." If you want to start a fight with your family, go home and say these words, "Who are my mother or my brothers or my fathers?" Oh man, I said first my mom would never hit me, but she would want to slap me if I said that to her. But she wouldn't. She wouldn't. But she would want to because that is offensive. That is harsh words, Jesus. What are you getting at? What are you saying here? And Jesus is defeating another argument about Him, not just who He is, but how do we have relationship with Him? You see, Jesus's family thought, we're His family. We have the right to tell Him when He's going too far. We have the right to tell Him that He is wrong and tell Him what to do because we have that familial relationship. I want to tell you friends, no external relationship will make you right with God. I work with the teens, the middle school and high schoolers, so I often tell them, but any kids, teens that are here, you're not saved just because your parents bring you to church. The question is, who do you say Jesus is? Do you repent of your sins? Do you have right relationship with God? Maybe you're here because you're an adult, but family or friends invited you and God is good to them, so I just want to know a little bit more about this God. We're glad you're here, but God being a friend of a friend is not going to save you. Are you right with God? Do you repent of sins and trust in Him and recognize Him as Lord of all? And I also want to point out that Jesus has already, and I just wanted to loop it in here, defeated the other second presumption of the scribes and the Pharisees on how they thought they could have right relationship with God. Scribes said, we are the religious lawyers of the day. You get all the benefits of being a lawyer. We think of lawyers, what do we think of? Liars, cheaters, swindlers. My wife's a lawyer. She's none of those things. Praise God. But we think negatively of lawyers, but we recognize they make a lot of money. They do good work. They're very smart people. So take all the benefits of a lawyer and all the benefits of being a religious leader like, oh, great, they're the moral virtuous lawyers. We are so upstanding in our society. Jesus didn't care. Jesus understood their hearts were not right with God. They had the most schooling. They had the highest education of the people of their days. Friends, I tell you, God doesn't care about how many letters come after or before your name. They don't care about what degree titles you have. Those are good. I'm not saying don't study, don't get education. But when you stand before God, He's not going to say, "Wow, PhD. Nice, nice. Okay, I guess you could come in." No. What makes us right with God is right relationship with Jesus Christ alone. Nothing societal, nothing external, nothing but faith and trust in Jesus Christ and obedience to Him will make us right with God. This is why Jesus says, "Here are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother." Do we do the will of God? Do we understand the will of God? This is where it connects back to blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit is the one who guides us in the will of God. So if you reject the Holy Spirit, you will never be able to do the will of God. So I challenge you today, Christians, anyone who is here, Christian or not, ask God for His Holy Spirit to guide you, to lead you in His will. Study scriptures that reveal God's will to all of humanity for us, and listen and obey them. I pray that we can be humble and quick in our repentance of our sin and bold in our obedience and faithfulness to Him. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, you are good and You are stronger than sin, you are stronger than Satan, you are stronger than the penalty of death. Lord, we thank you and we praise you. Remind us of your greatness, of your ability to forgive and your willingness to forgive when we are in sin. Help us to run to you quickly, to confess our sins to you and to repent quickly. As soon as we are convicted, help us repent, because we know how good you are, because we know how willing and ready you are to forgive. Lord, help us to then change our lives. Help us to live in accordance to your word, to faithfully follow Jesus, to recognize Him as our one true Lord over our lives and overall, and submit faithfully to you and to Him. So Lord, we thank you and we praise you. Encourage us with this text in Jesus name. Amen.

The Debbie Nigro Show
I'm Italian American But Was Wavering on 'Columbus' I Needed To Get The Facts

The Debbie Nigro Show

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 11, 2023 15:01


Hearing Negative Information About Someone You Thought Was Cool Is Always a Bummer.  Changes how you feel about them for sure.  Which is why I needed to talk about Christopher Columbus.  I've always celebrated my Italian American Heritage on Columbus Day. That one day a year, to have fun with and honor all my fellow Italian Americans here in the U.S. and honor all the Italian Immigrants who came over and worked so hard with their hands to help build this country. I'm aware Italian immigrants were persecuted badly, but I'm not sure everybody knows just how bad. Bad. Growing up people took the liberty of making fun of my being 'Italian" more times than I can count. And there were many oportunities closed off to me along the way, because of my ethicity that I just came to accept.   But I am proud of my heritage, as we all should be proud of our heritage, and I loved the whole big Italian family thing growing up and all the big Italian food. Italians by the way think food is love, so there was hummungous love which led to bigger sized clothes, but oh well. Anyway recently I felt needed a better education about Christopher Columbus. I was thinking if he was that bad a guy, I want nothing to do with him. I was also thinking OK, maybe we just change the name of Columbus Day to 'Italian Heritage Day' and not 'Indigenous Peoples Day' because even though I love Indigenous people and didnt want to hurt their feelings, I found out Indigenous People already have a day, so I figured ... we could just work it out and call it a day. Not that simple. I decided I'd better educate myself more on all fronts. Good thing I did! I had a fabulous conversation with Andre D'Amino, a successful business leader from N.J. and President of The Italian American One Voice Coalition (IAOVC), the largest independent Italian American anti-bias educational organization.   He's not in favor of changing 'Columbus Day' to anything else and he shared some FACTS why we shoudn't. He was clear many of the negative things people have heard recently about Christopher Columbus are not true. He said one of the the most important reasons we should keep Columbus Day as is, is because Columbus was the one who opened up the connection between the western world and  this part of the world, uniting it all together. That was big. Enjoy this podcast of our interesting Live conversaton on 'The Debbie Nigro Show'.  I think you'll enjoy learning some things I learned. If you'd rather listen  to the transcript it is below. AUDIO TRANSCRIPT  0:00:00 And now, back to the Debbie Nigro Show! 0:00:32 Rock and roll back to the Debbie Nigro show Hi guys, how are you doing today? Happy Columbus Day… Although I used to be happier on Columbus Day before all the conversation about… like Okay, this wasn't the best guy in the world… And maybe we should topple over statues of him… But we're still gonna have a parade. I'm a proud Italian American girl, daughter, family girl. Italians have always been about family. And I'm just really am confused.  So I want to understand more. And there's this amazing organization called the Italian American One Voice Coalition, the only national organization solely dedicated to defending Italian-American heritage and culture through education. And there's a terrific guy who is their president who's come from a unique family of inventors, Italian American inventors, and just very interesting. Andre D'Amino is joining me. Hey, Andre, how are you? 1 0:01:29 Hi, Debbie. Good to be with you today. 2 0:01:31 You know, I was wavering on whether I wanted to get into a discussion about Columbus on my radio show because I don't do politics, I don't do controversy, but I am wanting to understand more about what's going on. And I know this is what you do all day long in terms of defending the heritage and I'm such a proud Italian American girl, but when did this start going wrong about Columbus? Can you just tell me that? When was he 1 0:01:57 no longer cool? Well yeah, in fact I can tell you there was a very big uh... real start to this was when as a guy by the name of Howard is in who's a self-declared marxist an anarchist they wanted to destroy America and he did it by fabricating facts about our history and his history book which believe it or not is still being used in schools starts with Columbus where he made up false accusations and incorrect information and editor all kinds of things and he's been totally debunked by scholars and primary sources. But you know you want to attack America and you know he started with Columbus and now of course they're going after Jefferson Washington and others, but it did all start with Columbus amendment and unfortunately, it's been indoctrinated now in the past generation, because that book came out in nineteen early nineteen eighties and uh... there's even a Howards in the kit education project which continues the work of Howards and be against our country.  So listen, Columbus Day in Columbus is an important, iconic symbol to Italian-Americans, which has a great history, not only for Italian-Americans, but actually the world, because of what he accomplished by uniting the continents and bringing the world together. So, I do really wish you a happy Columbus Day. That's what today is. 2 0:03:09 I'm like, well, he did it for Spain. Didn't Spain say, okay, go here, here's the money and go. And I'm joking to myself driving up, of course they'd ask an Italian to get it done. But yeah, so he didn't really come to the United States. You're a fact guy. You're here to give us facts today, right? He went, where did he go, to the Bahamas? 1 0:03:33 Well, he went to an island called Hispaniola, which is actually where the Dominican Republic is in Haiti okay that's really that he never landed in what we call the United States now or even in uh... you know the middle part of uh... the the the continent it was down that area in the islands uh... he made a total of four voyages there and what was important I know they say well Leif Erikson and others were here before but the most important thing was that after Columbus arrived he opened up the connection between the western world in this part of the world. And that's why he's, it's really a seminal act of our world, uniting it all together, bringing Western culture to this part of the world. 2 0:04:10 Okay, cool. So, now we have this controversy where people are knocking over statues, and there's a lot of statues that have been knocked over around the world, not just Columbus. So, we're smart, you and I, we're smart people, we appreciate education, and so we know a decent person will know that he did some indecent things, but so did many people in history and at what point do you say, okay, now we don't like him anymore, we're smarter, this never would work in our day and age we have to knock over that statue, I mean, to what do you say about that? 1 0:04:42 Well, first off, let's talk about that era this was no Garden of Eden when Columbus got to this part of the world there was slavery child mutilations sacrifices cannibalism uh... and you know of course Columbus was a man of his times. You know we can't put five hundred years ago to today's standards we can't do it to the indigenous people and we can't do it to columbus but the things are saying about Columbus are just not true i'll give you a great example okay they claim that he attacked the tiny no tribes totally false as a matter of fact he protected the tiny milk tribe who was being hunted down by the carib tribe were cannibals and to prove that point is actually an indigenous person by the name of rafael ortiz who traces his lineage back to the tiny no tribe and he wrote four books defending columbus to correct that falsehood that howard's input out there and there's many other things like that you know for example he brought slavery to this part of the world. Totally not true. The indigenous people had plenty of slavery before he got here. Another one was that he brought disease and pestilence. He brought germs over. They didn't know what germs were back 500 years ago. So that's totally not true. And we could go fact for fact for fact of the things they're claiming Columbus did that he just did not do. 2 0:06:00 It's so exhausting trying to control the information that flows that's not correct in the world. Correct. Right. And it happens in multiple areas every day these days and it's exacerbated by the internet and the ability for information to flow so quickly. But I want to just take a minute on the indigenous people. I was here talking earlier in the show before you got on. I love the indigenous people. I want to celebrate them. I feel so bad about everything that happened to them that was wrong. And I'm an empath. I feel bad about things that happen bad to anybody, right? But why do you think they, or whoever they is, decided to take Columbus Day and say, okay, forget that. It's going to be Indigenous Peoples Day. Why couldn't they just say, fine, we'll have Italian Heritage Day, and then we'll also have Indigenous Peoples Day. What was the smasharoo? 1 0:06:49 Well, first off, let me tell you that i agree with you about celebrating indigenous people i i want to be right along with them celebrating but did you know Debbie that they've already got August ninth it is International uh... Indigenous Peoples day declared by United Nations great the day of the Thanksgiving which is called Native American Day and the whole month of November is for Native Americans right and I can tell you that since it's International Indigenous Peoples day on August ninth why take away a celebration for Italian Americans for indigenous people. Let's celebrate separately don't pick right against the other right and that's a little like a good mother an example that just occurred in a pop cup Florida they were considering eliminating Columbus Day they make an Indigenous Peoples Day and just like you're doing they listen to me I wrote to all the county commissioners are wrote to the to come to the uh... council people and explain to them that there is an international indigenous people's day on August 9th. And two weeks ago, that town did the right thing and preserved Columbus Day and declared August 9th as Indigenous Peoples Day. And that's the way we can join together. And don't forget also, Debbie, don't forget, Columbus Day is still a federal holiday. Indigenous Peoples Day is not. But we've got nothing against indigenous people, but don't pit one group against the other. 2 0:08:00 I agree, I agree, I agree. I want to point out that Columbus Day was dedicated by President Benjamin Harrison in 1892 and that was following the lynching in New Orleans of 11 Italian Americans. They were accused of a crime they did not commit and the day was made a federally recognized holiday by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1937 to honor the contributions of Italian Americans It's incredible how persecuted Italian-Americans were. And it was really a tough time when they came here for a better life, like most people do, and they're still doing, hoping for a better chance. And you know, it always breaks your heart wondering how brave people had to be to leave their country, to go to another country to try and find a new life. That's, you know, amazing. But yeah, the Italians were not treated very well. I read the story of the Kensico Dam. You know, Italians built dams. They came here because they were industrious and they were masons and they could build but they were the like the low low low on the totem pole yes low low low like there was no lower than Italians and they were paid I remember this reading the story I have one guy conned them all to come and he said they were gonna pay him $25 a week or whatever and then he took the money back and they were like just trying to like figure it out you know.  So here we are Columbus all right you know I wouldn't hang around with him now knowing he had some faults. Let's face it, you're telling me the facts of the... he didn't do bad things, but he didn't sound like the guy I wanted to invite to my dinner party. But anyway, why can't we change Columbus Day to Italian Heritage Day, or is that off the 5 0:09:26 table? 1 0:09:27 No, we totally disagree with that, Debbie. I have to tell you candidly, is that Columbus really is someone that did something that no one else really did. He united the world together and of course let's look specifically at columbus day specifically in the united states you said in eighteen ninety two president harrison declared the first quorum to stand before him to anniversary columbus arrival in this part of world but he did that to quell the problems that were occurring because italian americans were treated so poorly in fact it was almost going to be a war between italy in the united states because of all the lynchings of italian americans around the country and that's why this side of tab columbus day look at you know my own family my grandfather who had owned fishing boats when he was in sicily we keep a cold in the streets were paid with gold in the united states he came here in the early nineteen hundreds we got here he couldn't get any work ended up working on the docks of new york and he was paid less than the chinese less than the african-americans and he he told me that you know he used to be spit upon by the others, but when Columbus Day rolled around, he felt that that was a very proud day for Italian-Americans. Our ancestors, our heritage is there with Columbus Day. We shouldn't capitulate and give in just because there's this false stuff going up about Columbus Day. 2 0:10:40 We shouldn't do it. Okay, okay, that's why you're here. I needed some education. I was reading about the documentary, which I have not seen, The Italian-Americans, that was on PBS, and it was 150 years of history and what they mentioned as I was doing my kind of background homework this morning is something that happened in my life I don't know about yours we didn't speak Italian it was sort of like no no no you got to blend in that is not cool and I was very annoyed and I'm more annoyed now that I'm older that I don't have a second language because it was like keep that quiet how about your family well actually I'm actually a 1 0:11:12 combination of both because what I was born in Brooklyn and not only was everybody in my area from Sicily But they wrote from Argento the same place where parents came from so I actually didn't speak English as a kid Really folks Sicily Sicily. It's my first language However, just like you when my parents moved into New Jersey and when I was about six years old They wanted to assimilate and be American My father was so proud to be an American citizen and that's why they told me don't speak Italian out of the house So I thought it was something wrong about being Italian later on I realized it was just them wanting to be put me to be part of American society And I got my patriotism from my father, but I still do speak Italian. Oh you do. I'm a little jealous 2 0:11:52 I speak Italian food like I can speak a lot you know which nobody knows what I'm saying unless they go what I go calamari Italians um Italian American have their own language when it comes to food, right? What do you call it? Ricotta or ricotta? 1 0:12:06 It's ricotta if you say it properly in Italian, but I know a lot of people say ricotta. 2 0:12:10 Ricotta, right. And the calamar, you say that? Calamard, yep. It's good to laugh. You know, Italians can make fun of themselves, you know that, right? Sure. 6 0:12:20 But nobody else can make fun of us. 1 0:12:21 Well, you know, unfortunately, like our organization, the Italian American One Voice Coalition, we have to really do stand up against the stereotyping that's up there because unfortunately italian-americans are the last ethnicity that it's okay to bash you know we see so much stereotyping that still occurs every time you see an italian-american on a movie or tv show he's either a mobster, a mafioso, or a bimbo, or a buffoon and you know i challenge you debbie and your audience to come up with a positive portrayal of an italian-american in a popular tv show or movie you just can't do it I know. 2 0:12:50 I need a new show. 5 0:12:51 I was just invited. 1 0:12:52 I'm very proud to share this with you and also my audience. 2 0:12:53 I just got an invitation from the Italian consulate in New York City to come be a speaker 4 0:12:54 in November of Italian American Women's Success Stories. 2 0:12:55 I was really, really flattered. I'm like, how did you find me? I want to do my part to keep the heritage and culture going, as we all do from time to time. I'm going to be a speaker in November of Italian American Women's Success Stories Women's Success Stories. I want to do my part to keep the heritage and culture going, as we all do from wherever we have come. Right? I mean, we all have our family pride. But yeah, the whole Godfather story, it always blows my head that that's what keeps being shown. And you know who loves it more than anything else? The Italians, even though they know that's not how they want to be perceived. 1 0:13:39 Well of course the Godfather movies, you know, great cinema, we can't take away the fact of what they are as cinema, but it did really start in 1972, start this kind of craze about Italian American mobsters and mafiosi. You know, one thing, that was back in history, the one that actually hurts us more is The Sopranos because it took, it takes that and puts it in modern day suburbia. And that's what's really unfortunate. And you know, when they look at Italian Americans, they look at those shows and there's so much more accomplishment by Italian Americans. 2 0:14:06 Yeah, I gotta just continue this conversation some other time with you. But boy, oh boy, did you come at the right time to this show today. I can't thank you enough, Andre. Domino, I'm saying your name correctly, right? The president of the Italian American One Voice Coalition. Really nice to meet you. I'd like to have you back another time to talk about your family's company and all the inventions along the way that we've run out of time for now. But continued great success to you and have a great Columbus Day. 1 0:14:32 Thank you, Debbie. Happy Columbus Day. 2 0:14:34 Pleasure. Nice to meet you. All right, when we come back here on the show, I think we should talk about more of what Italians have invented. I got you through the Castro convertible sofa, Mr. Coffee in the Jacuzzi. Can you imagine what I'm going to tell you about next. Oh, you have to come back and that'll be in just a moment here on the Debbie Nigro show. Transcribed with Cockatoo                  

Mosaic Boston
Yes, God Really Said

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 8, 2023 43:10


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your Word, and we pray that You make us a people that love Your Word and love every part of Your Word and people that love Your law even. As the psalmist in Psalm 119 says, "O, how I love Your law. It's my meditation all the day. Your commandment makes me wiser than my enemies for it is ever with me." Lord, I pray that You give us a love for Your law, and I pray that You give us a desire to meditate on it all the day. And I pray that You make us a people who grow in wisdom and knowledge and discernment. Lord, as we continue our sermon series in the Gospel of Mark, I pray that You focus our attention on not just how Jesus taught or how He lived, but how He did everything He did according to Your will, to fulfill Your commandments. And Lord, I pray that You extend grace to us, that if we and where we break commandments that You forgive us and then You give us grace to live according to the law. Lord, I pray that You bless our time in the holy Scriptures. Send us the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, regenerate anyone who's not yet a believer, speak to their hearts, and draw them to Yourself. And Lord, fill them with the power of the Holy Spirit. And continue to refine Your church, Lord, to continue to build up Your body and with the washing of water, with the Word continue to cleanse Your bride. We pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We call it Kingdom Come: The Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's kingdom. And the title of the sermon is Yes, God Really Said. There are two ways offered to people, two ways of life. One way promises God likeness and one promises godliness. Both offer a way of becoming like God. The first one is offered by Satan, God's adversary. He tempts each person with the following: "Reject God's law and you'll become like God, God likeness, defining what is good and evil for yourself. The second way is offered by Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who says, "Follow me in keeping the law of God from the heart." Satan is too crafty to just come out and say, "Reject God's law" or "Follow me." No, the way Satan builds his kingdom is by veiling, God's law, by obfuscating, distorting it. And he does it by undermining it with the question, did God really say? Did God actually say? Those are his very first words spoken in Scripture when he tempts Eve, "Did God really say that on the day that you eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil you will die." Jesus Christ comes declaring with divine authority, "Yes, God really did say. God really said it." God really did give us a law, a perfect law, an everlasting law written by the very fingers of God. It was initially just called the Word, the Word of God, written with His finger, the Ten Commandments. Trivia question: who was the very first person to break all Ten Commandments in one day? It was Moses when he broke the Ten Commandments as he's coming down from the mountain. I asked two people this week and within two seconds of asking, I asked my third daughter and she nailed it. I was like, "How did you know?" She's like, "It's obvious." But that happened because it's a symbol, it's a symbol of the fact that God has given us His law. And the very first thing that the person entrusted with the law, the very first thing he does is break it. Why does he break it? Because he sees the people of God not worshiping God. His heart was broken by the fact that their hearts were so far from God that they wanted nothing to do with worshiping God. And therefore, God does send us the law and the prophets. God gave the Ten Commandments through Moses to all of humanity in all places for all time. God also provided a sacrificial system for atonement when the people of God broke commandments. Then God sends Jesus Christ as the king to establish God's kingdom on earth. What are the laws of the kingdom? It's the Ten Commandments. Matthew 5:17-20, Jesus said, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you'll never enter the kingdom of heaven." So when Jesus says, "I've come to fulfill the law," what does He mean? To fulfill the law means that Jesus kept the law, He followed the law. He kept every one of the Ten Commandments from the heart, and then He offers Himself as a sacrifice to provide atonement for our law-breaking. Then He says, "Repent of your breaking of God's law. Receive forgiveness. Receive a new heart. And in that new heart, the wineskins, new wineskins and filled with new wine of the Holy Spirit and with the indwelling power of the spirit in the new heart. We want to follow God from the heart. We want to obey His laws as they're written on our heart. The righteous law of God, which condemns our sin, is as permanent as the good news from God, which promises salvation from sin's judgment. It's an inside-out kingdom because God regenerates our hearts, writes His law on our hearts. We want to obey the letter of the law and also the spirit of the law, which is love. It all starts in the heart, but it doesn't stay in the heart. And that's really the issue with Jesus and the Pharisees. We keep coming up on Him going toe to toe with them in debate on the Sabbath. Why? What's the fight over? It's what is God's law? They ended up adding traditions and regulations, their own law on top of God's law to obfuscate the law. So today we're in Mark 3:1-19. Would you look at the text with me? "Again He," Jesus, "entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. And they watched Jesus to see whether He would heal on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him. And He said to the man with the withered hand, 'Come here.' And He said to them, 'Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?' But they were silent. And He looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, 'Stretch out your hand.' He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against Him, how to destroy Him. "Jesus withdrew with His disciples to the sea, and a great crowd followed, from Galileo and Judea and Jerusalem and Idumea and from beyond the Jordan and from around Tyre and Sidon. When the great crowd heard all that He was doing, they came to Him. And He told His disciples to have a boat ready for Him because of the crowd, lest they crush Him, for He had healed many so that all who had diseases pressed around Him to touch Him. And whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they fell down before Him and cried out, 'You are the Son of God.' But He strictly ordered them not to make Him known. "And He went up on the mountain and called to Him those whom He desired, and they came to Him. And He appointed 12, whom He also named apostles, so they might be with Him and He might send them out to preach and have authority to cast out demons. He appointed to the 12: Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter, James the son of Zebedee and John the brother of James, to whom He gave the name Boanerges, that is, Sons of Thunder, Andrew and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him. This is the reading of God's holy and infallible, authoritative Word. May He write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, King Jesus defends the law of God. Second, King Jesus endures the crush of service. And third, King Jesus appoints the 12 apostles. First, King Jesus defends the law of God. Here in verse one it says, "Again He entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand." The emphasis here is on the word again. This was the pattern of Jesus' life, on the Sabbath day, He would go to the synagogue, which was the place of the gathering of the people of God. He did this on a weekly basis. He enters this synagogue, this was his way of going to church. And the way of Jesus is the way of God's law. He fulfilled God's law. When He says, 'Follow me,' He say follow me in obeying God's commandments. And thus the emphasis on the fourth commandment, thus the emphasis on the gathering to worship God on the Sabbath. He's keeping the fourth commandment, and He's doing it from the heart. He gathers on the Lord's day to give God His due glory because He loves the Lord His God with all His heart, soul, strength, and mind. And in the synagogue are the Pharisees, the representatives of big religion, the religious establishment. They were pitted as the enemies of Christ here because Christ's popularity is growing His authority, it's self-authenticating. They're losing authority, and they recognize that Jesus is a threat to their dominion, so to speak. In verse two, "They watched Him to see whether He would heal Him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him." It's a gentleman with a withered hand and most likely it's an image of paralysis, most likely he couldn't work. The Pharisees are watching Jesus closely because they're concerned with Sabbath observance. The word for watch here is used in the Septuagint and other places in the salter of sinners who are lying in wait for a righteous person to slay him, lying in wait. So the Pharisees who objected to Jesus eating with sinners, well, they are revealing themselves to be sinners here. So that they might accuse Him, they want to bring charges against Him because they're breathing murderous plots in their hearts. So this is the second run in with big religion over the Sabbath between the Pharisees and Jesus. In the previous text, they accused Jesus' followers of not following the Sabbath law. Here they're accusing Jesus Himself. Why? Because the deliberate transgression of the Sabbath law carried the death penalty. If they can find Jesus breaking the Sabbath, they can bring charges against Him in order to execute Him. Exodus 31:12, "And the Lord said to Moses, 'You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, "Above all you shall keep My Sabbaths, for this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you. You shall keep the Sabbath because it is holy for you. Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among the people. Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath shall be put to death. Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations as a covenant forever. It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed."'"And He gave to Moses, when He had finished speaking with him on Mount Sinai, the two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God. And then in Numbers 15:32, "While the people of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath. And those who found him gathering sticks brought them to Moses and to Aaron and to all the congregation. They put him in custody, because it had been made clear what should be done to him. And the Lord said to Moses, 'The man shall be put to death, all the congregations shall stone him with stones outside the camp.' And all the congregation brought him outside the camp and stoned him to death with stones as the Lord commanded Moses." So Jesus is here to fulfill the law. He's fulfilling it. Now the question is, is He transgressing the law by healing on the Sabbath? Well, Jesus is going to heal the man on the Sabbath. He has an opportunity to do a good work. And no, He's not transgressing the law, as He's going to explain, because the law was given for the people of God as a day that is designated in holiness. This day is different. This day is devoted to the Lord, and it's devoted to good works. So no, doing good works on the Sabbath does not transgress the fourth commandment. Verse three, He tells the man, "Come here." Jesus calls him to stand up publicly. Jesus knows that the man wants to be healed, and if the man truly desires healing, he must confess his need and show his faith in the power of Jesus Christ by standing up in the face of the whole congregation and displaying his need. It's a moment of public confession, of faith, and potentially costly confession. He understands by standing up and doing what Jesus says, he is going against the religious establishment which might come at a cost. This is one of the reasons why baptism is what it is. Jesus Christ commanded us to be baptized, and baptism is a public profession of faith. When we do baptism here at Mosaic, we ask that whoever's being baptized to come on up and to answer one question, why do you love Jesus Christ? We do that because that's the pattern of Holy Scripture and that's commanded to us. The person gets up, and they're confessing their need for Christ. "I've broken the commandments. I need Christ. I need His sacrifice. I need His grace. And I commit to follow Jesus Christ all of my days." So that's what He's doing here. And then Jesus, before He heals the man, He has a theological debate with the Pharisees by asking them a question that leaves them silent. He said to them, "Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?" But they were silent. And here Jesus is getting at the intent of the law, and He's saying, "What is the point of the law?" The point of the law is that God is a God who loves life. He's the creator. God is love, so whatever he does command, the point of what He commands is love. He's given us the law because He loves us, He wants us to flourish. This is the pattern of the less life, the life of shalom, the life of universal flourishing. So on the Sabbath He's saying, "What's lawful? What's lawful? Is it lawful to do good or to do harm?" The point of the Sabbath is to designate one whole day where we do good, where one-seventh of our waking hours are devoted to God, loving God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind, and to love people, to do good. The reason why they fall silent is because they understand that in their hearts they are intending to destroy Christ. What are they doing in the Sabbath? Are they doing good, or they doing harm? They're doing harm. So Jesus reads their minds, He asks a question that answers the doubts of their heart, and He's like, "Obviously the point of the Sabbath is to do good, is to promote life, is to promote rest in the Lord." And also, He is showing them their inconsistency. On the Sabbath they allowed for people to rescue animals. Obviously if it's true for animals that they could be saved on the Sabbath, it's an order of magnitude more true for humans as image bearers of God. This is more explicit in Matthew 12 where it says, "He went on from there and entered their synagogue. And a man was there with a withered hand. They asked Him, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?" so that they might accuse Him. He said to them, "Which one of you who has a sheep, if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will not take hold of it and lift it out? Of how much more value is a man than a sheep. So it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath." According to most of the rabbis, they would argue that what Jesus here is doing transgresses the Sabbath law because the man is not in imminent danger. According to most of the rabbis, and certainly those the Pharisees followed, unless the person's life is at stake, it's work to help the person. But there's nothing remotely even close to that in the Old Testament. Why are they judging Him according to a standard that's not in Scripture? Well, by the time that Christ has come, they have created an elaborate set of rules regarding what could and could not be done on the Sabbath. And their rules, their own regulations, their own traditions were presented as inert, infallible, and more authoritative than the Word of God itself. Jesus here is saying, "No, I'm not going to be ruled by human tradition. I'm not going to be ruled by human rules and laws. I'm going to be ruled only by the law of God." Jesus was, and that's why He's the righteous king. We always have to be careful of that. Whenever we look at the faith, we have to ask, "Is this in Scripture? Is this from the Holy Scriptures, or is whatever we're doing, whatever we're teaching, whatever we're following, is it based in tradition and human tradition?" So Jesus as the holy one of God, He knows exactly what God's law says, and He knows the letter of the law and the spirit of the law, and He's saying that, "No, on the Sabbath we should be doing kindness. It is permitted. We should be doing good works. There's no better day of the week to do good works than on the Sabbath." The Pharisaic attitude, on the other hand, not only misses the point of the day but smacks of indifference to this human being who's suffering. So they were silent. Their silence is hostile. They understand that they have been publicly humiliated because how do you answer that question? There's only one answer, and they know that Jesus is right. They understand that they've lost face in front of the people, in front of the crowd, which makes them for dangerous enemies. To what extent was it lawful to watch for the life of another as they were doing? They're looking to destroy Christ. Verse five, "And He looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, 'Stretch out your hand.' He stretched it out, and his hand was restored." There's anger in Christ's heart because He understands that they don't have love for God and they don't have love for neighbors. So they are law-breakers and they present themselves as the guardians of the law. So he's angry at that. He's angry and grieved at their hardness of heart. Hardness of heart is willful refusal. When you see a miracle in front of you, when you see the power of God in front of you, when the truth is evident and you just choose to refuse it, choose to not believe. Some of the commentators are saying that this appeal of hardness, it's actually an illusion to in the Old Testament where Pharaoh exhibited hardness of heart. He saw miracle after miracle after miracle after miracle, and he chooses to harden his own heart, and then God hardens Pharaoh's heart as well. Some of the commentaries say that that's why the Pharisees, it's a play of words, Pharisees and Pharaoh perhaps. But the hardness of heart is the Son of God is in front of them, the Son of God who knows the Word of God better than them, who reads their thoughts and actually does miracles right in front of them to authenticate that what He's saying is true, in the face of all the evidence, they still choose to disobey. Jesus heals the man, and He does so by telling the man, "Stretch out your hand." Here you see the cleverness of Jesus. Can they accuse Him of doing works by healing the man? Well, what was Jesus' work? Jesus told the man, "Stretch out your hand." The man stretches out the hand, the man does the work, and as he does, the man is healed. Verse six, "The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against Him, how to destroy Him." The Herodians were the Jewish supporters of Herod. And so you have the religious Jews, that's the Pharisees, and the political Jews, the Herodians, teaming up, uniting in wanting to kill Jesus Christ. How to destroy Him, that's a phrase that was used by the demons when they said, "Are you the Son of God come to destroy us?" And here the Pharisees are seeking to destroy Christ. Big religion's response to Jesus stands in stark contrast to the other response, which is the crowds. They flock to Jesus Christ to experience healing and to experience exorcisms. And this is point two, King Jesus endures the crush of service. Verse seven, "Jesus withdrew with His disciples to the sea, and a great crowd followed from Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem and Idumea and from beyond the Jordan and from a round Tyre and Sidon. When the great crowd heard all that He was doing, they came to Him." He withdraws, and the emphasis here is that He's leaving the danger from the Pharisees. Withdrawal from danger fits in this context. And it shows us that as He goes outside He's entering Gentile territory. He shows that He's not just the savior of Israel but the savior of the nations. As He told the shocked Pharisees in Matthew 8:11, He says, "I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." So the people flock to Jesus Christ. In verse nine, He told His disciples to have a boat ready for Him because of the crowd, lest they crush Him. The crowd is growing and they're exerting pressure on Him. It's a phrase that's used metaphorically, to oppress or afflict. These are people that know that Jesus can meet their physical needs. They're attracted to Jesus primarily for that. They're pressing in to just touch Him and get just a taste of His power to be healed. Jesus backs away from them onto the boat that's probably owned by Peter, James, and John. And He heals them. In verse 10, "He healed many, so that all who had diseases pressed around Him to touch Him." The word for press here and crush, those are two implications that when Jesus comes as the Messiah, as prophesied in Isaiah 53, our diseases will be placed upon Him, our chastisement and sins will crush Him. This is Isaiah 53:4-6, "Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteem Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with His wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Along with healing, Jesus exorcizes demons. Verse 11, "Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they fell down before Him and cried out, 'You are the Son of God.' And He strictly ordered them not to make Him known." The human and demonic reactions to Jesus here are similar. The human sufferers fell upon Him, the unclean spirits fall before Him, and they confess that, "You are the Son of God." This is the second time in Mark that Jesus is called the Son of God, the first time by God the Father. He said, "This is my Son, my beloved Bon whom I'm well pleased and whom I've taken delight." The demons say similar thing, "You are the Son of God," but there's no love for Christ in their hearts, that's why they're demons, and they do not delight in Him. But Jesus doesn't want their confessions. He tells them, "Don't say this out loud." Because it's not their job to proclaim the good news. It's not their job to proclaim who He is. That's the job of His followers. Speaking of His followers, this is point three, that King Jesus appoints the 12 apostles. Verse 13, "And He went up on the mountain and called to Him those whom He desired, and they came to Him." And here Jesus as sent on the mountain, recalls Moses as sent to Sinai. Throughout the Pentateuch in Exodus 19, God prophesies and He said, "Israel is my treasured possession." And here Jesus in calling the disciples calls them to intimacy, that they are His treasured possession. Another important mosaic ascent of Moses occurs in Exodus 24 when Moses ascends Sinai in the company of the priests and the elders and sets up 12 pillars to symbolize the 12 tribes. The emphasis here is on Jesus' call. He called the disciples to Himself. He initiates the call. Those whom He desired, it's to emphasize His power of choice, that He chooses whom to follow Him. When Jesus calls, it's a prophetic call, and it's a call that's effectual, with a desired effect because God's Word does not return to Him void. Isaiah 55:11, "So shall My Word be that goes out from My mouth, it shall not return to Me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it." So they come up the mountain with Him, they follow Jesus. They leave behind whatever their vocational calls were in order to devote themselves to Christ. In verse 14, "He appointed 12, whom He also named apostles, so that they might be with Him and He might send them out to preach and have authority to cast out demons." He appoints the 12, and this reawakens the Jewish hope that the Messiah will come, renew the nation, and these 12 are to symbolize that. What does He call them to? He calls them to be with Him. He calls them to be with the presence of God. In the Garden of Eden, the greatest blessing that Adam and Eve experienced in that garden, the greatest blessing was the fact that they had unfettered access to God. They walked with God in the cool of the day. Whatever questions they had, they could ask God face to face. He knew them, they knew Him. When we listen to Satan's lies of, "Did God really say?" and we rebelled against God, they lost that access to the presence of God. They lost the ability to walk with God in the garden. Jesus Christ comes and He offers His presence. He offers the presence of God. He offers that same ability for them to walk with God. So He called them to be with Him, that's the first step. Before they preach, they got to spend time with the Lord. But if you spend time with the Lord, if you truly experience the presence of God, your heart gets filled, it brims with truth about God, and you have a desire to speak about the Lord. So He calls them to be with Him, and then He calls them to preach, to preach the good news. A lot of Christians, they just want to be with Jesus. That's all they want to do. Jesus, me, Jesus. It's all privatized. It's all very self-focused. No, Jesus says, "If you spend time with Me, go and make disciples of all nations. If you follow me, I'm welcoming you into the mission of God." And what is the mission of God? To seek and to save that which is lost. He gives them power to preach the word and also authority to cast out demons in the name of Jesus Christ. He gives them power over even the demonic realm. In Mark 3:16, "He appointed the 12. The first one was Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter." Simon was His Hebrew name. He's renamed by Jesus to Peter. In the Greek that's Petros. So he's got a Hebrew name, Simon, he's got a Greek name Petros. And then the Apostle Paul affectionately calls Peter Petros. He calls them Syphus. If anyone that knows multiple languages, you know affectionately you do that with people, you call them their name, but you do it in the language that only the two of you know. Syphus is the Aramaic version of Petros, which is the new name, and Simon was his Hebrew name. I say that because a lot of people think the disciples were morons. They're like, "Oh, He picked fishermen. They don't know anything." These guys were very well-educated. They grew up most likely trilingual in an area that was trilingual. They knew Aramaic, they knew Hebrew, and they knew Greek. That's why Jesus chose them, because they knew the scriptures of Hebrew and Aramaic, and they understood how to communicate it to the Greek world and the Greco-Roman Empire. So Simon Peter is the first one. And then verse 17, "James the son of Zebedee and John the brother of James, to whom He gave the name Boanerges, that is Sons of Thunder." Then Peter, James, and John, they formed the inner circle of the three disciples of Jesus Christ. He changes the name of Peter. He gives the others, James and John, He gives them a nickname, but Peter is the one that gets the name changed. And this is significant because of the patriarchs in the Old Testament, whenever God chose the spiritual leader of the people, He would change His name, Abram to Abraham, Jacob to Israel. Abraham is called the rock in the Old Testament, which is why Jesus, who gives primacy to the leadership of Peter, calls him the rock. Isaiah 51:1-2, "Listen to me, you'll pursue righteousness you who seek the Lord. Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you, for he was but one when I called him, that I might bless him and multiply him." So Peter is presented as the man in charge. That's why in all the lists of the disciples he's the first one. This is why Jesus resurrected Christ, revealed Himself to Peter first. James and John are called Sons of Thunder. Why? Because they had a hot temper. They were very zealous for the Lord, and sometimes the zeal overcame their wisdom. For example, in Luke 9:51, "When the days drew near for Him to be taken up, He set His face to go to Jerusalem. And He sent messages ahead of Him, and he went and entered a village of the Samaritans to make preparations for Him. But the people did not receive him, because His face was set toward Jerusalem. And when His disciples James and John saw it, they said, 'Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?' But He turned and rebuked them. And they went on to another village." I always find that text funny or interesting. "Jesus, You want us to call fire from heaven? No one believes here, let's just smoke the whole place." What if Jesus said yes, "Yes, I want fire from heaven."? They'd be like, "Jesus, could You send the fire?" Everything they did was in the power of Jesus. What Jesus is there saying is, "They didn't receive me, yes, but hold on, the power of the Spirit isn't here yet. That'll come on the day of Pentecost." And that changed their hearts as well. The other disciples in Mark 3:18, "Andrew, and Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him." I'm not going to get into what the names is, but the titles here are important. Simon the Zealot is pointed out. Who were the Zealots? They were nationalist party willing to fight to free Israel from Roman rule. So on the one hand, you got Simon the Zealot. They hated the Romans, and they hated anyone that collaborated with the Romans. And then you got Levi, who then became Matthew, was a tax collector. Who's he collecting taxes for? The Romans. So God brings these two people, diametrically opposed, completely different political ideologies, perspectives in the world, brings them together and saying, "Now I'm going to show you what it means to love one another as I have loved you." Iscariot, Judas Iscariot, it's from the Greek sikarioi. Commentators say there were also a group of Jewish revolutionaries who practiced assassinations. Perhaps that's why Judas did ultimately end up betraying Jesus Christ, because he assumed Jesus was going to be primarily a political king. And the first time that Christ came, He came to build His kingdom from the inside out by saving people. Although the text ends on a somber note, foreshadowing of violent crucifixion, the main theme of this text is joyful of being called by God, being called by God's grace, being chosen by Jesus Christ, personally enlisted in the war where battles are won by proclaiming good news and thereby shattering demonic structures of evil. God gave the Ten Commandments through Moses, and Jesus Christ lived according to the Ten Commandments. He summarized them by saying, "This is the point: it's love God and love people." He was asked, "What is the greatest commandment?" and He said, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind. The second one is love your neighbor as yourself." But in summarizing the Ten Commandments, He does not obliterate or abrogate the Ten Commandments. The summary does not abrogate the expansion of which is a summary. A lot of people think that in the old covenant the law was in force, then Jesus Christ comes and gets rid of the law. A lot of Christians think in the new covenant there is no law and the new covenant is just grace. I would push back and say, "No, that's not true." Because in Hebrews 8 it says that in the new covenant, when God gives us new hearts, He writes His law on our hearts. Which law? It's God's law, the Ten Commandments. This is Hebrews 8:8, "For He finds fault with them when He says: 'Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt. For they did not continue in my covenant, and so I showed no concern for them, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord, I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, "Know the Lord," and they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and will remember their sins no more.'" I do, I pray for a day when the Spirit descends upon our town, upon our city where people's hearts are regenerated, and then they turn to Jesus Christ as king. And then what? Then I pray that they join the Body of Christ, join the church. Recently school restarted, and I have a high schooler now, so I was driving to the high school. I have a high schooler now, Christ. I was driving to the high school and there was traffic everywhere. I've never seen that many people on the street just crossing left and right. And when it's that chaotic, we've got crossing guards. Just families going to school. I was like, "That's awesome that that happens Monday through Friday. Imagine if that happened on Sunday. That's where people just come and they're drawn by the Spirit and they want to worship God and they want to obey the fourth commandment, which is worshiping God on the Sabbath day." We practice Sabbath on a Sunday because Jesus Christ rose from the dead on a Sunday. The church was birthed on a Sunday. Have you broken any commandments? Jesus Christ calls us to repent, believe, and follow the king. I do want to mention that obeying the commandments and loving God's law, the approach with God's law is very different than the approach of man-made laws. I've been pulled over one time by the Brookline Police. On Route 9 going east, there's a speed trap, it goes from 55 to 35. I realized I try to obey man-made law basically to keep the cops away, to keep the authorities away. I don't keep the law to get to know them or to have a relationship with police. No, no, no, just leave me alone. But it's the opposite with God's law. That's why Psalm 119, meditate on Psalm 119, says, "I love your law, O, Lord." Because the law is an extension of God. God is holy, His Word is holy, His law is holy. By walking in the commandments of God, you grow in holiness and you grow in the presence of God. You grow closer to the Lord. Have we broken the commandments? Of course we have. What are we ought to do? We are to repent and believe that Jesus Christ fulfilled the law perfectly in our behalf. And then He goes to the cross and He bears the penalty for our law-breaking. The wrath of God comes down upon Him. Why does Jesus do that? So that after He is resurrected and ascends, when we repent and believe, our sin is counted to Him on the cross and His righteousness counted to us. And He gives us grace to do what? To then follow Him. And following Him means following Him in the obedience of the law of God from the heart. Following King Jesus and keeping God's law and to live lovingly is to live lawfully, and to live lawfully is to live lovingly. Hebrews 5:9, "And being made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey Him." Does that verse contradict salvation by grace through faith? No. It's the inevitable outworking. We're saved not by our works, not by fulfilling a law, but by Christ's work in fulfilling the law and Christ's work on the cross. And then we're saved by grace through faith for works, which is walking in the commandments of the Lord. 1 John 3:24, "Whoever keeps His commandment abides in Him, and God in Him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us." If you're not a follower of Jesus Christ, today, the Lord commands you, King Jesus commands you, God commands you, follow Christ by repenting of sin, turning to Him, receiving grace, and then following Him the rest of your days. And then if you are a believer, is the law of God, is it on your mind, is it the meditation of your heart? This is what every single one of us should be doing, every day going through the commandments, "Lord, where have I not kept the law from my heart? In those places, Lord, forgive me, give me grace, and give me the power of the spirit to live in obedience to you. Amen. Would you please pray with me in conclusion? Lord Jesus, we thank You for being a great God, and we thank You for being a great king, a righteous king. We thank You, Jesus, that you don't call us to do anything that You have not done yourself. When You call us to live in obedience and obedience of faith, it's because You've already done that. You are the champion of our faith, and You lived perfectly according to the law. And Lord, we thank You for saving us. We thank You for giving us, and we pray for the power of the Spirit to empower us to continue to walk in Your ways and continue preaching the good news to those who are far from You, so that people meet You, so that people are transformed by You, so that Your church is built up and so that You are glorified. We pray for a revival. We pray for Your Spirit to fall on this church, to fall upon our neighborhood, on our community, on our town, on our city, and we pray, Lord, that You do that for the glory of Your name and for our joy. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Seek First the Kingdom of God

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 1, 2023 50:27


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, as we come to you on this communion Sunday and we will remember the sufferings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, we come to you with hearts full of gratitude. We thank you for the salvation that you offer us. Each one of us has broken your holy law, the 10 Commandments. We have transgressed the commandments, and the penalty for our transgression is banishment from your kingdom for eternity. Therefore, we're so thankful for the Lord Jesus Christ, who came and lived perfectly according to the commandments and taught the people what your word is, what you expect, what the duties and the obligations are. As they recognize that they haven't fulfilled the commandments, they sought grace, they sought forgiveness by repenting of sin. Lord, that's what we do today. We repent of our sin. We repent of our self-righteousness. If there's anyone here who thinks that they don't need grace, if they are like the Pharisees who consider themselves healthy, why would they need the great physician Jesus Christ, I pray today show them that every single one of us has sin and every single one of us we need grace, and every single one of us is sick in our souls and we need the healing of Jesus Christ. Lord, we thank you for the gift of a new birth, the gift of a new heart regeneration. When we repent of sin, you give us that new heart. You write your laws upon our heart, and you imprint them on our minds. And then you give us the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit and the Spirit is placed in that new Holy Spirit. Today, empower us and we pray convict us where we need to be convicted to live a life of faith and obedience to our Lord and Savior. Bless our time, the Holy Scriptures, Lord. We pray all this in Christ's name, amen. We're continuing our sermon series in the Gospel of Mark called Kingdom Come, the Gospel of Mark and the secret of God's kingdom, and the title of the sermon today is Seek First the Kingdom of God. How often do you think about food? How often do you think about clothing? How often do you think about money, material things? To think about physical things is human. We need food to live. However, you can be full and live life to the full, materially speaking, and still not experience the fullness of life. You can be full, yet empty in your heart. Jesus Christ said that he came to offer us life and life to the full. It's not that Jesus doesn't want you to eat, drink, relax, and enjoy life. He doesn't want you to live primarily for those things. He doesn't want you to be ruled by your appetites. He doesn't want your stomach to be your God. He doesn't want money to be your God. He doesn't want your appearance to be your God. He doesn't want your job to be your God. None of these things satisfy the soul. Only he does and only he can fill your heart with joy and joy unspeakable. Matthew 6:31, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, "Therefore do not be anxious saying, 'What shall we eat or what shall we drink or what shall we wear?'. For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you." In our text today, we see Jesus Christ, the king of kings, King Jesus bringing joy into the world. His kingdom is a joyful kingdom. His followers rejoice in his presence. Would you look at the text with me? We're in Mark 2:13-28. He went out again beside the sea, and all the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching them. And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus, sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, "Follow me." And he rose and followed him. And as he reclined at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. The scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners." Now John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, "Why did John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?" And Jesus said to them, "Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. No one sows a piece of shrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from old, and a worst tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins." One Sabbath he was going through the grain fields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. And the Pharisees were saying to him, "Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?" And he said to them, "Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him, how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?" And he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. The Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath." This is the reading of God's holy and unfathomable authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, King Jesus heals sin-sick sinners. Second, King Jesus serves new wine, and third, King Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath. First, King Jesus heals sin-sick sinners. As was Jesus' way, as was his mission, he comes teaching and preaching the word of God. He said earlier that that's why he came to teach people God's word and to teach them that we have broken God's law and to show them that we are under condemnation, that we need grace. He's the only one who can offer that grace as the one who fulfilled the law perfectly and then offers his substitutionary atonement on the cross for us, for our lawbreaking. He's teaching them. As he passed by, he saw Levi, the son of Alphaeus, sitting at the tax booth. He said to him, "Follow me." And he rose and followed him. Levi, whose name is changed to Matthew later, he actually wrote the Gospel of Matthew and he does not introduce himself as Levi. He introduces himself as Matthew. That's what he calls himself. The name Matthew means a gift of Yahweh, a gift of God. He wanted everyone to know that when he followed Jesus Christ, Jesus changed him. Jesus changed his heart. Jesus changed his purpose. Jesus changed his whole life, his whole identity. Therefore, Jesus gave him a new name, not Levi, but Matthew, the gift of God. Well, the gift of God before he met Jesus Christ was not a gift to most people as a tax collector. Anyone named Levi at this time most likely came from the tribe of the Levites and their hereditary job was service in the temple as priests. But the life that Levi chose, it was diametrically opposed to being a priest in the temple. Instead of choosing to serve God, he chose to serve money. Money was his true God. No matter the cost, he followed the money. In passing by him, Jesus fastens his eyes on Levi. It doesn't say that he saw a tax collector. That's what everyone else saw. A man judges by appearance. Jesus Christ, God judges by the heart. It says he saw Levi, he saw the person, he saw the eternal soul, and he saw what he could do with him if Levi followed. Tax collectors were collectors of indirect taxes, especially in the transport of goods. That's why he's sitting at a toll booth. The Roman Empire was in charge at this time, and what they do is they look at a district and they would assess how much money they could get from that district doing as little work as possible. They assess how much, and then they would sell a license to collect taxes to whoever the highest bidder was. This was a farming system to the highest bidder. Whoever paid for that license, they gave Romans the money. Romans took that money, and then it was the job of the tax collector to get his money back and more, and overcharging was the usual. The buyer had to hand over the assessed figure at the end of the year and keep any extra for himself. There was ample opportunity for extortion, for exploitation. Obviously the locals and the people of that region did not like tax collectors. They hated them. These were corrupt lackeys of the hated imperial presence. They were traitors' turncoats. They collaborated with the Romans, the oppressors, and fleecing their own people. Usually to be a tax collector, you were involved in some criminal activity. Most likely you had friends who were thugs and gangsters and enforcers to get your money back. The religious people of the time hated tax collectors, viewed them as unclean, wouldn't even allow them in the synagogue or the temple. They were excommunicated by default. Jesus comes to this guy Levi that everyone absolutely hates because of his chosen path in life. Jesus looks at him and commands him, "Follow me." He says he rose and followed him. Something happened in his heart where he realized, you know what? I have been transgressing God's law and there is one that has come that said he's the Son of God, that he is the king of kings. I'm going to follow him. He does that. In following Jesus Christ, he had to make a decision that was a little different from the other apostles. The other disciples, Peter, Andrew, John, and James who were previously called by Jesus, they were fishermen. They could keep their fishing business on the side as they follow Jesus Christ. They even used their boats in the ministry of Jesus. In the next text, they provide a boat pulpit, so to speak. Jesus was on the boat and he was preaching to the people. No, for Levi to follow Jesus Christ, Levi has to leave this job. He has to leave this corrupt path that he had chosen. For Levi, it meant leaving behind his thieving ways. He's no longer to follow money, but Jesus. In Matthew 6:24, no one can serve two masters, for either he'll hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. When Levi broke the command, thou shall not steal by taking from people more than he should have, the reason why he broke that commandment was because he broke the first commandment, and the first commandment was thou shall not have any gods before me. Levi, his God was money. Jesus comes displaces money on the throne of Levi's heart and Jesus now is king. Now, where did they go? Jesus says, "Follow me." We saw this with Peter. Jesus told Peter, "Follow me." And then the next text, they end up at Peter's house. Follow me. Where are we going, Jesus? We're going to your house. And all of a sudden, Peter's house became a place of ministry and his roof got disassembled. That was last week. Same thing here with Levi. Levi, you have wealth. Levi, you have a home. Levi, you have friends from your former life. Now, what are we going to do? We're going to go to your house and you're going to throw a feast, and you're going to invite all of your former colleagues to come and meet me. That's exactly what happened in Mark 2:15. As he reclined at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. Is this clear evidence that this was Levi's house? We get the clarity of the evidence from the parallel passage in Luke 5:27. After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, "Follow me." And leaving everything, he rose and followed him. And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with him. Levi understood that to follow Jesus Christ wasn't just to join a Bible study or to study theology. He understood that to follow Jesus was to enter the work of Christ. What was the work of Christ? He said, "I've come to fish for men, to save people from the nets of captivity and sin of Satan." That's what Jesus has been doing and this is what he called Peter James and John to do. This is what he called Levi to do. Follow me and I will make you become a fisher of men. This is what Levi is already doing. He's fishing for sinners to free them from the nets of Satan and sin. It's not just random people that he's never met. Who's he invite? It's people who knew him, who knew him inside and out, who knew his heart, who knew his whole past, his old business acquaintances, and he gets them together for a party. He doesn't know much theology. He just knows that this one Jesus has come. He's claimed to be God. He's claimed that we've transgressed his law, and he's claimed that if we repent, he gives us forgiveness of sins and welcomes us into his kingdom. The lesson here for us is when you come to faith, when you come to faith for the very first time in Jesus Christ, don't just cut off all of your social network. Don't just cut off all of your former friends. If Jesus has saved you, he saved you for a reason. He saved you to impact people that know you. You share your testimony. You get them together. You throw a party. You have a little feast and you say, "Look, I might not know everything there is to know about Jesus, but I know Jesus. I know that I've broken the commandments, the 10 of them, and Jesus Christ is the only one who offers me forgiveness. What's stopping you from trusting in Jesus Christ now?" They're reclining at table. That means this was a big feast. This was the posture of dining at feast in the Greco-Roman world. Regular meals, people would just sit at tables. Luxurious meals, they would sit back and enjoy themselves. What we see here is they're relaxed. Their guards are down. They're having a good time. There's food, friendship, fellowship, and Jesus is at the center and he's teaching them the word of God. There's tax collectors and they're sinners. What's the religious establishment do? They get worried. On Mark 2:16, and the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" The scribes of the Pharisees, these are the people who are in charge of religion. They're in charge of who's in and who's out, who's clean and who's unclean, who's righteous and who's unrighteous. They don't view that Jesus is following their traditions. He's not following their traditions. In their traditions, you don't hang out with tax collectors and sinners. Those people are sinners. We are the righteous. We're better than they are. They don't belong in our presence. The New Living Translation that translates the tail end of verse 16, why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners, it puts it like this. Why does he eat with such scum? It brings out the hatred that they experienced toward these people. Why does he eat with such scum? They didn't view these people as in need of righteousness. They view these people as people that could never receive forgiveness, could never be entered into the kingdom of God. I wonder if you have people in your life that you categorize in this category. You might not say they're scum, but they're like people that even Jesus couldn't save them. Do you have people like that in your mind? For me, I got a love-hate relationship with tow truck drivers. Tow truck drivers, they're number one. Number two is parking enforcement. But tow truck drivers, I view them as tax collectors because they can charge whatever they want. If they got your car, they take it to their lot and they charge you for the towing fee, the parking fee, all their fees, and then you pay for the ticket on top of that. Jesus said we got to love everyone, but he also said you are to love your enemy. They've been kind of my enemy camp, like tow truck drivers, and they're in that camp until you need them. A couple of weeks ago, I shared that I had issues with my car, with my Suburban, battery problems. We fixed the battery. Friday I drive. For two weeks I was good. Friday I drive home, park the truck, then I go later, restart it. I put it in my parking spot, dead, dead. All the lights are on but won't start. Click, click, click. I tried to do everything I could, and in the morning I went to the mechanic. The mechanic's like, "You got to bring it here." I don't know what to do. He's like, "Here's a phone number." I was like, "Of who?" He's like, "A tow truck driver." I was like, oh no. Cassidy Towing pulls up. I like that little motto, the small business, their motto is Don't Cuss, Call Us. A gentleman comes out of the tow truck and he's like, "What do we got here?" Thick Boston accent. I'm like, yeah, I love these people, but love-hate relationship. I was like, "It's not the battery." He's like, "It's the battery. Trust me." I was like, "It's not the battery." He slams his hand in my door and then he just started cussing really loud. It's Saturday morning. I was like, dude, come on. I got to live with my neighbors. I was like, it says right there, don't cuss. So then we got to talking and there's a car behind my truck. He's like, "We got to get this car moved if we're going to tow." I was like, all right, I guess we'll wait. And then immediately at that moment a lady comes down and she's like, "Oh, you need to move my car?" I'm like, yeah. I told him, "I guess God hasn't forgotten us yet." He's like, "You think so?" I was like, oh, that's my in. Great. His name's Matt and he let me drive in his truck as he's taken to the mechanic. And then we got to talking and got to talk about his family, got to talk about the fact that he grew up in Brookline. His grandma's been here since '77. He went to Devotion School, formerly known as Devotion School, and we got to talking. He's like, "What do you do?" I was like, "I'm a pastor." He's like, "You're a pastor." I was like, "You should come to our church." He's like, "Oh yeah." We got to talk about the Lord. I'm praying for Matt. I pray for people like that where it's like, you know what? Probably not welcome anywhere, but they're welcome here. We welcome sinners because Jesus welcome sinners and we're all sinners. This posture of the Pharisees of they're scum and we're not, that's what actually kept them from salvation. That's what kept them from knowing that Jesus Christ is Lord and Jesus Christ is savior. They thought that if we spend time with sinners, we are going to be infected with their sin. What Jesus Christ is telling them is everyone's infected with sin. Everyone's soul is sick with sin. If you think that you're healthy, you're never going to go to Jesus the physician to ask for healing for your soul. But if you know that you're unhealthy, if you know that you're sick, that's the first step to being healed. That's what Jesus tells them in verse 17. When Jesus heard it, he said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners." Jesus came not to call the righteous. What's he mean? He means self-righteous. He means people who think I don't need God because they measure righteousness according to their own standards. That's what the Pharisees did. By what standard do we figure out if we're righteous? By the standard of God's 10 Commandments. Did the Pharisees fulfill the 10 Commandments from the heart all of their life? Of course, they didn't. They themselves were sinners. They themselves were unrighteous, but they didn't see that. Pride was in the way. This is how we are to do evangelism and share the good news of Jesus Christ. Invite sinners into your home. The way we do church at Mosaic is we simplify the church. We expect that you come to worship gatherings, and we expect that you come to a community group during the week, but we don't want you to spend much more time with just believers. Hanging out with believers is fun. Bible studies is fun. Studying theology is fun. We can't forget we have a mission. In a place like Boston where everyone's really busy, everyone's got a lot of stress in their life, we have to carve out time to spend with those who are far from the Lord to get to know them, to invite them to your house, to have a meal, to practice hospitality, and to introduce them to Jesus Christ, the great physician of our soul. Your soul, dear friend, is sick apart from Jesus Christ. It's sick with sin and Jesus is the only one who can heal you. He heals you at the very moment that you ask for him to forgive you, you repent and you say, "Lord Jesus, I want to follow you. I want to follow you like Levi no matter what's keeping me back from you. I want to leave the sin. I want to leave anything that easily entangles and follow you." In John 17:15-17, Jesus prays for his disciples. He says, "I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world." Jesus saves us in the world. We are not of the world, so we're not like the world, but we're in the world. As saved sinners, as sanctified sinners, we are to do everything possible to be sanctified by the word of truth and then to share that same word with those who are far from the Lord. Point two is King Jesus serves new wine. In verse 18, now John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, "Why did John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?" A fasting in holy scripture is abstaining from food for spiritual reasons. The Pharisees, they saw in scripture that there is fasting. People of God do fast, abstain from food for prayer and for proximity to the Lord. There was one day that was commanded for fasting, that was a day of atonement for everyone once a year. But what this passage is concerned with is not the annual fast, but the additional voluntary fast that were practiced by the Pharisees. This is how they wanted to show the people around them how fastidious they were in their spirituality, just how religious they were. They assumed that Jesus Christ did not fast because his disciples didn't fast. Did Jesus Christ fast? Yeah, he fasted for 40 days. They just didn't know about it because he didn't fast to be seen by people. But Jesus does tell us that in the Sermon on the Mount we are to fast. In Matthew 6:16, when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. The disciples of John fasted. The disciples of the Pharisees fasted. But Jesus says, while I'm here in my physical presence, my disciples do not need to fast. Because what's the point of fasting? The point of fasting is to come closer to the Lord. The word says, if you come close to God, he will come close to you. If the point of fasting is proximity to the Lord, when the Lord is with the disciples, they don't need to fast because they already have his physical presence. Jesus says, "When I do leave, then my disciples will fast." Well, why didn't the disciples need to fast? Because Jesus answers in verse 19, Jesus said to them, "Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast." In Jewish law, wedding guests were freed from certain religious obligations in particular because of the wedding. If there was a day of fasting, they were not obligated to do it. Why? Because what's the point of a wedding? It's to rejoice. Jesus says, "I am the groom. And in my presence, we are not a fast but feast." Imagine going into a wedding. It's a good wedding where they've got appetizers. The best weddings, the appetizers are the scallops wrapped in bacon. If you see one of those coming out, that's a good wedding. Imagine there's a plate they bring you and you're like, "Oh, no, thank you." What? And then the next waiter comes with the lamb chops. Oh, that's next level. You're like, "Oh, no, thank you." Why aren't you? I'm fasting. You're fasting on a feast day? That doesn't make any sense. Jesus, he is the bridegroom, John the Baptist in John 3:28, the text says, you yourselves bear me witness, that I said, "I'm not the Christ, but I've been sent before him." The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom who stands and hears him rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. Therefore, this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease. Here, Jesus by invoking the wedding imagery, he's saying that the Messianic Age has arrived. In Isaiah 62, the future redemption is compared to a wedding feast. Isaiah 62:4, you shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight is in Her, and your land Married, for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married. For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your sons marry you. And as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you. Jesus is the bridegroom. He's the groom. Everything he did, he did in order to redeem a bride. That was the point of his whole life. That was his goal. That was the goal of the sacrifice on the cross. The bride is the church. The bride is all the redeemed. The bride is us. Verse 20, the days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. Jesus here by using the phrase taken away, that's a phrase from Isaiah 53:8. By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? He's alluding here to the fact that he will be taken away, his physical presence will be taken away through the crucifixion, resurrection, and then ascension. And then when he is physically taken away, we are to fast. Fasting from food for the purpose of drawing closer to the Lord should be a regular rhythm of our lives as followers of Christ. Verse 21, no one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, and the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. Here he's talking about a new cloth was not pre-shrunk and the process of washing and drying the garment would cause it to shrink. What he's saying is you can't just come to Jesus and say, "Jesus, I need a new patch of grace. I need a new patch of forgiveness." He's saying that when you come to the Lord, he doesn't just patch you up. When you come to the Lord, you become a new creation. You are regenerated from the inside out, and that's how God's kingdom grows from the inside out. You get a new heart and that new heart is filled with the Holy Spirit, and then Jesus Christ clothes you with the robes of his righteousness, not just he patches up areas of your life. In the old garment, that imagery is used in Hebrews 1, where Christ rolls up this old world garment and unfurls the new cosmos. Hebrews 1:10-12, and you, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you'll remain. They will wear out like a garment, like a robe you will roll them up, like a garment they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will have no end. Jesus is saying something brand new is here. He is bringing in the new covenant, ushering in the new covenant. The new covenant is different from the old covenant because the old covenant did not give us internal power to fulfill the law. A lot of people think that the new covenant abrogates or gets rid of the 10 Commandments. It does not. The new covenant actually, it says in the new covenant, it says God will give you a new heart and he will write his laws upon your heart, imprint them on your mind, where you want to do the will of God, the 10 Commandments, from your heart because you love God and you love people. And then finally, you have the power to do it because of the Holy Spirit. That's why he brings in the wine imagery in verse 22. No one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins. The new wine was a symbol of the new age, like in John 2, or Jesus at the wedding in Canaan in Galilee turns 180 gallons of water into wine saying that the new Messianic era is here. Jesus doesn't just pour in the Holy Spirit into our hearts. No. First, he regenerates our hearts, that's the changing of the wineskins, and then brings in the new wine. The imagery there is that wine was kept in leather skins and old skins were less flexible and fermenting wine kept inside of them would expand and sometimes burst the skins. If you put new wine into old skins, it's going to burst and you ruin both the old and the new. You need new wine for new wineskins. What he's saying here is don't just come to the Lord with your preconceived human traditional categories and say, "How does God fit into my categories? How does God fit into my manmade humanistic paradigms?" No. When you come to the Lord, you say, "Lord, obliterate any paradigm that is not from you. Build up your paradigms in my mind and heart, and then give me the power to live according to them." Whenever the fresh life of the spirit breathes into the church new life, paradigm shifting category, destroying life comes in. Christianity with all its outward differences was not a breach of Judaism, but its fulfillment. And now with the Holy Spirit offered to us, and when you come to the Lord, you repent of your sin, he gives it a new heart to house the Spirit of God. Jesus has been physically absent since his ascension, but that absence is paradoxically the means by which his presence is achieved. And then we see in the text following an escalation in the tension between Jesus and the Pharisees. Jesus' disciples are implicitly accused of breaking the pharisaic traditions first of the table fellowship and now of fasting. But now the Pharisees are like, okay, it's not just our traditions. Now he is breaking, they are breaking our interpretation of the law. And that's point three, King Jesus's Lord of the Sabbath. One Sabbath he was going through the grain fields. And as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. And the Pharisees were saying to them, "Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?" The disciples are a little hungry. Perhaps all the fasting talk got them are really hungry. They want a little snack and they're making a little snack in the grain field. The Pharisees, who've been spying on them, by the way, it sounds like a lot of work that they're doing spying on them, but they come to Jesus and they're like, "They're breaking the law." That's why they use the word lawful. They're doing what is not lawful. Jesus dining with the tax collectors and sinners, they couldn't say that was not lawful. They said that he's breaking our traditions, he's breaking public spiritual decorum, religious decorum. And now here they are accusing them, the disciples and Jesus, of breaking the fourth commandment, the commandment requiring the keeping of the Sabbath Day. They knew that this was an important commandment. It's the longest of the commandments. It's the only one that hearkens back to creation. It's the only one in which we are commanded actually to imitate God himself. They noticed that among the 10 Commandments, this one receives special attention. Exodus 20:8- 11. Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, or your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea in all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath Day and made it holy. Is this commandment relevant to us today? Well, of course, all 10 Commandments were given to all people that lived in all places at all times. This is how God decrees how he wants us to live. This is how King Jesus rules his kingdom by the 10 laws. They're commandments. They're not just recommendations. This is the law of God. This commandment, number four, is part of the first four that show us how we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind. If you love God because he has first loved you, you devote a full day, every seven days you devote a full day of the week totally to God. God, this day is holy. You made it holy. God, I want to bless you on this day, and I pray this day is a blessing. Do you want the fullness of life that King Jesus offers? Keep the Sabbath. This, of course, includes gathering with the people of God to worship God. We worship God because that's his due, and God commands you to attend church. We are to gather with the people of God, and we do it on Sunday because Jesus rose from the dead on Sunday and the church was birthed on Pentecost Sunday. Obviously we are to go to church on a Sunday. By the way, if you notice how Jesus operates, he's in synagogue on every Sunday. This is where the Pharisees get him. Whenever there's a Sabbath, he's in the synagogue and he's teaching the word of God. What's he teaching? He's teaching them that we've transgressed the 10 Commandments. And by the way, the 10 Commandments, this is where you show people their need for grace. In evangelism, a lot of people want to talk about Jesus and grace first, which doesn't make much sense to people who think that they haven't broken any commandments. God has given us the 10 Commandments. You show people where they've transgressed commandments, and that the penalty for sin is death for eternity in a place called hell. We need Jesus Christ. This is how I share the gospel. Whenever I see someone breaking a commandment in my presence, I've gotten to the point where I just call them to repentance right then and there. With a smile and loving, I just call them to repentance. I was at the boxing gym this week and we're doing grueling workout on Thursdays. It's me and my friend Billy. Billy and I are brothers in big arms. That's what we call each other. Billy is next to me. The grueling part of the workout, the first 20 minutes we're just dead, and I sat down for a sip of water. He comes up to me and he says, "Jesus Christ!" He said it like that. I said, "Is king, Billy." I was like, "You transgressed the third commandment, Billy." He's like, "Oh yeah, I used the Lord's name in vain." I said, "Billy, you need to repent. "He said, "I repent." I was like, "King Jesus forgives you. Now follow him." And then we continued the rest of the workout. I planted the seed. We're going to continue the conversation, but that's what transgression, you broke the law, which shows you your need for Jesus Christ, the only one who lived according to the law perfectly. Therefore, he could represent us on the cross. The Pharisees are spying on Jesus here. They're waiting to catch him in some transgression. If they had caught him in transgression, they would have presented that as evidence at his trial before the Sanhedrin. They had no evidence to present. Therefore, they knew that he did not break the commandment. He broke their interpretation of the commandment, which would not hold up in the Sanhedrin. Jesus could not be accused of breaking any of the commandments at his trial. That's why they had to bring in false witnesses, and we see that later on in the text. Jesus isn't breaking their commandments. The Pharisees aren't breaking their commandments. The Pharisees viewed this as work because they viewed it as a subset of reaping which is prohibited on the Sabbath. That's how they operate. That's how they built their rules. They said, okay, here's the 10 Commandments, but then how does that work out in real life? They would add their own interpretations, and then their interpretation distorted the word of God because their interpretations were more important than the word of God in defining what is sin and was not. How does Jesus respond to this in Mark 2:25? And he said to them, "Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him, how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priest to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?" First of all, just notice how Jesus argues with them. He says, "Have you never read?" He counters their misinterpretation of God's word with God's word. In the story of David and Abiathar the high priest, David and his soldiers are exhausted and they enter the house of God. They're hungry. They're famished. He said, "Do you have any bread?" They said, "We have bread, but this is bread that's only allowed for priests to eat." They would bake 12 loaves, and on the Sabbath they would leave it on the table and then wait for a week. And then next week, those 12 pieces of bread... What's the word? Those pieces of bread were then replaced, and then the priests would eat that bread. The issue here is that the ceremonial law, that's the law that Jesus is referring to with Abiathar the high priest. That's part of the ceremonial law. If you study God's law, the 10 Commandments, that's the moral law. That's for everyone. The ceremonial law, that was how you are atoned before God, made righteous before God. David comes in and says, "God's law, the 10 Commandments, is more important than the ceremonial law. Because if we don't eat, my soldiers are going to die. The word says thou shall not kill." That's the issue that's going on. That's why Jesus goes to this example of the loaf. What Jesus is saying is if David could say that the moral law was higher than the ceremonial law, how much higher is God's moral law over human interpretation and the rabbinic traditions, et cetera? Jesus here trumps their human traditions with God's law with the 10 Commandments. I saw a clip of a famous podcaster, and he was just talking about... He's like, "Human existence is the greatest thing in the universe." He said, "I wish we had a manual for how human existence could be best done. What's the optimal way of living? What are the hazards that we are to stay away from?" I'm like, this is it, bro. That's what the 10 Commandments are. This is why Jesus said, this is for life. This is the fullness of life. The commandments are given to us as a manual. It shows us how we best operate. It shows us how we can be connected with God, how we can love one another, and it shows us that when we break the commandments, there's grace that we can access. Thanks be to Jesus Christ. And then Jesus says that the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. Why? Because the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, is king of kings and the 10 Commandments is his 10 Commandments, and the fourth commandment is ruled under Jesus Christ. He says that Sabbath is made for man, not man for the Sabbath. The Pharisees, they lived for the Sabbath. Fulfilling the Sabbath was so much work that it wasn't restful for people, and Jesus restores the compassionate aspect of the original Sabbath, which in the interim was effaced by the hardheartedness of the Pharisees. Have you always kept the fourth commandment from the heart all of your life? No, you have not. You have transgressed that commandment. I have transgressed that commandment. What is Jesus telling us today? We are to repent, and we're to ask for forgiveness and make the Sabbath a priority. Jesus obeyed it, all of the law, to forgive us for disobeying the law. Jesus was crucified on a Friday, and then he said with his last breath, "It is finished." And then his body rested in a tomb on the Sabbath, and Jesus rose victoriously on Sunday in order to give us power to devote every Sunday to him. This is how you and I follow the risen, ruling, and reigning king. This is how we begin to live life to the full by saying, you know what? Every start of the week, the first day, I'm going to devote to the Lord, and this is how I'm going to seek first the kingdom of God. And everything else shall be added onto you. Today is Holy Communion Sunday. We talk about bread, the loaves of the Presence, and we talked about the new wine. Jesus Christ gave us Holy Communion and he gave us the symbols of bread and wine in order to turn our attention, to focus our attention and our memory on the suffering of Christ on the cross. I'm going to read 1 Corinthians 11:23-32. For whom is Holy Communion? Holy Communion is for repentant followers of Jesus Christ. If there is unrepented sin in your life that you know of, right now is an opportunity for you to repent and trust in Jesus Christ to receive grace. If you do not repent, we ask that you refrain from this part of the service. But if you today repent of sin and turn to Christ, you're welcome to partake. I'm going to read 1 Corinthians 11:23-32. For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way also, he took the cup, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world. If you'd like to partake in communion and you have not received the elements, please raise your hand and one of the ushers will bring them to you. With that, I will pray over Holy Communion. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the gift of salvation that was purchased for us on the cross by Jesus Christ. Lord Jesus, you were absolutely without sin. You had never sinned, not even once. There was not one commandment that you broke. You gladly lived a life of obedience to God the Father, empowered by the Holy Spirit. Lord Jesus today, we remember your sufferings on the cross. We remember that your body was pierced with nails as you were crucified to that tree. Lord, your blood was poured out so that we could be forgiven. We remember your body that was broken so that we could have healing from the great physician. We remember your blood, which removes our guilt and shame. Lord, today we come to you with contrition of heart. We come to you with humility, recognizing that we are not righteous, recognizing that we are like the tax collectors and the sinners. We are like the scum of this earth. And yet, Lord, you chose to love us, you chose to pour out your love for us, and you chose to call us to yourself. Lord Jesus, as we partake in Holy Communion now, I pray that this will be a blessing for us. I pray as we receive the bread and the cup and as we internalize these physical symbols, I pray that we also receive your grace, and that by your grace we are transformed from the inside out. We pray all this in Christ's holy name, amen. There are two lids, one at the top, which opens the cup, and one at the bottom, which opens the bread. On the night that he was betrayed, Jesus Christ took the bread. And after breaking it, he said, "This is my body broken for you. Take, eat, and do this in remembrance of me." He then proceeded to take the cup and he said, "This cup is the cup of the new covenant of my blood, which is poured out for the sins of many. Take, drink, and do this in remembrance of me." Lord Jesus, we thank you that you came with power, and we thank you that your word is effectual. That when you tell us to repent, you also give us the power to repent. When you tell us to follow you, you give us the power to do it. When you tell us to believe and trust in you, you give us the gift of faith. I pray that you, Lord, continue to draw us closer to yourself, continue to sanctify us from sin, and continue to empower us to be witnesses of your grace, witnesses of salvation to all those around us. I pray that we follow the example of Levi, who threw a great feast for all his tax collector and sinner friends, and invited you to be the center of this so they can meet you, so they could have their sins forgiven, so they could follow you and be transformed from the inside out. I pray, Lord, that you empower us to do the same with our friends, with our neighbors, with everyone around us, Lord, who is far from you. Lord, continue to draw them to yourself and continue to miraculously build up your kingdom here in Brookline and Boston, Massachusetts and beyond. We pray all this in Christ's holy name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Supernatural & Revelation

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 24, 2023 48:46


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Welcome to this space. Every once in a while, I'm glad that we worship down here, it's to keep us humble, keep us grounded, and to remind us that the space upstairs really is a blessing. We're continuing our sermon series called Kingdom Come through the Gospel of Mark: The Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom. The title today is Supernatural and Revelation. So Jesus Christ has come as a king, and in chapter one, he was anointed by the Holy Spirit and the King comes preaching that the kingdom is here, the kingdom has been established with the coming of the King. Therefore, what are we to do? We are to repent of sin, believe in him and follow him and live for the King. Jesus Christ did come performing supernatural miracles for the purpose of revelation to reveal that he is the Son of God and he performed what only God can do. Only God can forgive sins, and that's what Jesus does. He cast out demons, he heals the sick, he even resurrects the dead. And what's fascinating is that the contemporaries of Jesus Christ, those who saw his miracles, those who experienced his power, most of them did not believe in Jesus Christ, they did not have their sins forgiven. And it wasn't until the day of Pentecost, St. Peter's filled with the Holy Spirit, he has the indwelling power of the Spirit and he preaches to these same people and he preaches to people who have seen the miracles of Christ, have heard his sermons, seen his crucifixion, heard about his resurrection, but they weren't saved. The miracles did not convert their hearts, they didn't yet have their sins forgiven and their hearts were still hardened by sin, in disbelief. In Acts 2:22, Peter says, "Men of Israel, hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, losing the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it." And it's not until they realize that they have sinned against Jesus Christ, the Holy One of God, that they're cut to the heart. This is Acts 2:37, "Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, 'Brothers, what shall we do?' And Peter said to them, 'Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit for the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.' And with many other words, he bore witness and continue to exhort them, saying, 'Save yourselves from this crooked generation.' So those who received the word were baptized and there were added that day about 3000 souls." So the Apostle Peter responsible for much, if not most of the material of the Gospel of Mark, he presents the miracles of Jesus Christ in such a way that they attest to who Jesus is. He is the King and he offers us, every single one of us, the greatest miracle, the miracle of all miracles, salvation by grace through faith, forgiveness of sin and entrance into the Kingdom of God. And in our text today, we see that Jesus heals a leper and he heals a paralytic, but only one of these men walks away with his sins forgiven. And the question posed before us is, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul, forfeit his soul? What's the point of being healed of paralysis if you then use your legs to serve sin and Satan? What does the profit a man to gain pristine skin in this life while being tormented in hell for eternity? So Mark 1:40 through 2:12, would you look at the text with me? "And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling, said to him, 'If you will, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will. Be clean.' And immediately, the leprosy left him and he was made clean. And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once and said to him, 'See that you say nothing to anyone, but go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for proof to them.' But he went out and began to talk freely about it and to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places and people were coming to Him from every quarter. And when he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. And many were gathered together so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was preaching the word to them. And they came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. And when they could not get near because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him. And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay. And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytics, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.' Now some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts, 'Why does this man speak like that? He's blaspheming, who can forgive sins but God alone?' And immediately, Jesus perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves said to them, 'Why do you question these things in your hearts? Which is easier to say the paralytic, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Rise, take up your bed and walk'? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, 'I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home.'' And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all so that they were all amazed and glorified God saying, 'We never saw anything like this.'" This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word, may he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, the King is used. Second, the King is sought. And third, the King is questioned. First, the King is used. In Mark 1:40, the gentleman is characterized as a leper. He has a scale disease and this term designates a variety of conditions in which the skin becomes scaly, but not what today is called leprosy or Hansen's disease. But in Leviticus 13 and 14, this skin disorder was treated as a grave danger to the purity of the community. So sufferers were regarded, in effect, as corpses, walking dead, and physical contact with them produced the same sort of defilement as touching dead bodies. Leviticus 13:45 say, "The leprous person who has the disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose. He shall cover his upper lip and cry out, 'Unclean. Unclean.' And he shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp." So the disease was serious and also, it rendered the person socially as an outcast. Josephus, the ancient Jewish historian, he said that the disease, those with it were treated as, in effect, walking dead. And if anyone is healed, it was as if someone dead was raised to life. If the person so much has stuck their head in someone else's house, the house was rendered unclean. So the person has been suffering, he's been suffering for a long time, both physically and socially, and what happens is he hears that Jesus Christ has come, he has power and he has been healing people. And the man, immediately, boldly comes to Jesus Christ, it says imploring him, pleading with him. And it's followed by kneeling. So he's entreating with the most earnest urgency, he's crying out, "If you will, you can make me clean." And first, this is great. This is a great start. And pain does this often, suffering does this often. God often allows us to go through seasons of suffering. C.S. Lewis says that pain is God's megaphone to wake us up. So he has pain, he goes to the one that can alleviate the pain and he implores him. And with humility, he asks, "If you will, you can heal me," that, "You have the power." So we see even faith here. In verse 41, it says, "Jesus is moved with pity," in the English Standard Version, "he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will, be clean.'" Now, if you are reading along in your Bible, most likely, there's a footnote right there at that word, moved with pity or moved with compassion. So this is a question of which word is original. There is a textual question here. The oldest manuscripts that we have do not say moved with pity, it says moved with anger. And if the word was compassion, most likely, in the parallel, Matthew and Luke and the story, that word would've been used, it is not. And if you study textual criticism, you get to text like this, you got to ask why would a scribe change the word? Most likely an overzealous scribe here, read the word anger, Jesus is angry, and he can't believe in an angry Jesus and so, he changed the word to compassion. But I do see an anger here. I do see the indignation of Christ here, a similar indignation to where Jesus, it says, was indignant in John 11 about the death of Lazarus. He was deeply moved in the spirit and greatly troubled. So perhaps there is anger here, we'll see why. And Jesus does stretch out his hand, certainly compassionately, and he touches this man, the Greek pronoun him is left out. So He just stretched out and touched this person, shocking to anyone seeing this because you weren't supposed to touch a leper. Jesus touches the leper, and instead of the impurity passing from the man to Jesus, Jesus's power overcomes the impurity and disease. In verse 42, "And immediately, the leprosy left him and he was made clean. And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once." Sternly charged, it's a word that means growling, it refers to the snorting of a horse. And as applied to human beings, it means to express indignation by explosive expulsion of breath. And I think that's biblical, whenever I'm in traffic, that's how I breathe with this expulsion of breath. My wife rubs my arm and I feel better. And then, he uses the word to send out, ballo. And it's the same word that Jesus used to exercise demons. So it was like casting this man out. He ejects the person from his presence and then he charges him, verse 44, "And said to him, 'See that you say nothing to anyone, but go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for a proof to them.'" And what he's referring to is Leviticus 14, if you have been healed, you are to bring three lambs or one lamb and four birds depending on a person's wealth. And as proof to them, as proof to the priesthood that Jesus has come with the power of God. What does the gentleman do in verse 45? "But he went out and began to talk freely about it, to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer openly enter town, but was out in desolate places and people were coming to him from every quarter." And what an amazing, wondrous moment this must've been for the gentleman, having lived for so long, ostracized by society, no human contact. He had lived in isolation for years perhaps, and pain without a single touch of a human hand. What does he want to do? He wants to immediately go show his family, show his friends that he has been healed. And you say, "This is great." This is like, "Jesus, you healed the person. He's basically a walking advertisement to your power. Don't you want him to go and preach about you?" And Jesus didn't want him to because Jesus knew that the substance of the man's message is going to be come to Jesus as the miracle worker, come get this blessing, come get healing from Jesus. And Jesus doesn't want just to heal our bodies, he doesn't just want to meet our physical needs. No, Jesus has come to preach the word, to convert our hearts, to regenerate us, and to save our souls. And what we see here is that the word, but to contrast, Jesus said, don't do this, and the word but is saying he went directly against the orders of King Jesus. Jesus' anger may also stem from the fact that the man completely disobeyed Jesus' instructions. The ability of Jesus to heal now becomes the cause of his inability to move about. Jesus came to preach, he came to preach the gospel and now he can't do that. So he ends up in a desolate place, it says. And this is fascinating because that gentleman had to live in a desolate place, he had to live away from people, he gets healed. And then, right after the healing, Jesus is the one in the desolate place. And what's the text showing us? It's showing us that Jesus exchanged places with the leper. Jesus is saying, "Not only am I willing for you to be clean, I'm willing to make myself unclean for you." And this is really at the heart of the gospel. It's the double imputation, Jesus gets our sin, we get Jesus' righteousness. 2 Corinthians 5:21, "For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might be become the righteousness of God." Galatians 3:13, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who's hanged on a tree,' so that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the gentiles so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith." Instead of repenting and believing in the content of Jesus' preaching, the man disobeys Jesus tells everyone that Jesus had healed him, which makes it more difficult for Jesus to preach the gospel. The poor man was so thankful to be healed, but he missed the whole point. What was the point? The point was that he had a deeper uncleanness, he had a deeper leprosy, he had an issue that separated him, not just from the people of God, but from God himself. And he receives the skin healing, but he doesn't receive the heart healing. His faith is only skin deep. He did the right things, he came to Christ, he implored, he kneeled, he begged, he received, and then, he walked away only to disobey the king, revealing that he has not received the cleansing of his soul from sin. God does miracles, God does miracles even today, but the miracles always have a purpose, it's always to attest to the person of God. And unless we repent of sin, those miracles aren't going to do anything for us, not spiritually speaking, not eternally speaking. So when we do experience seasons of pain, when we do go through difficulties, yes, do go to the Lord, yes, beg for the Lord's healing, but stay there, stay with the Lord, stay obeying the Lord. We had a nice lady that came to our community group for quite some time. And she said, "I don't believe. I don't believe. I'm here, just you guys are nice people." And I was like, "Okay, keep coming." And she said, "I don't believe because there's too much suffering in the world. How can a good God allow so much suffering in the world?" And that day at community group, she's like, "For example, there's a hurricane coming directly at Mexico right now and it's going to absolutely decimate Mexico and thousands of people are going to die. Where's your God now?" I was like, "Look, I don't know. Let's pray. Let's pray. Let's pray for a miracle for the hurricane to change directions. Let's pray. The Spirit blows where it wishes, so does the wind." So we pray, we fervently prayed, prayed zealously. And I remember that just like... The next day, what does the hurricane do? The next day the hurricane completely changed its trajectory, completely misses Mexico. And I was like, "Oh yeah, I can't wait for community group. She's going to come in extra saved." And then, she comes to the group, pretends nothing happened. And I was like, "Remember our prayer request?" She's like, "It was a coincidence." I'm like, "No. Oh, my goodness. There's no such thing as a coincidence." Miracles don't save anyone. God does do miracles, but there is a passage where a rich man dies, and a gentleman named Lazarus goes to heaven. And the rich man says, "Lord, please, Father Abraham, resurrect Lazarus, bring him back so my brothers don't end up in this place of torment." And what does the Lord say? The Lord says, "Even if someone comes back from the dead, they're not going to believe." It's not enough. I've seen people experience the power of God in their life and then I've seen them walk away. During COVID, we had a gentleman that came to service. You could tell something was wrong and he's like, "I think I have a demon. Can you please pray for the Lord to cast out the demon from me?" I prayed. His body language completely changed. He received forgiveness from the Lord. And then, I gave him my number. And then, he just disappeared. He received a gift from Lord, disappeared. And then, I found out that he went back to his sinful lifestyle instead of repenting and following the Lord. So don't allow your faith to just stay there at the physical level or at the skin level, no, follow the Lord and ask for the greater healing, which is that of having sins forgiven. Point two is the king is sought, Mark 2:1, "And when he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home." So Jesus returns to Capernaum, that's his base of operations for the early portion of his ministry. And it says he was at home, whose home is this? And scripture doesn't say that Jesus had a house. Most likely, this is Peter's house because Jesus called Peter in chapter one, "Follow me." And then, Peter says, "Where are we going?" And Jesus ends up at his house. "Follow me to your house because that's now my house." And this is how Jesus operates. When Jesus forgives you of your sins, he is now your king. You and everything you have now belongs to the king, in service to the king. So Peter's house, what is Peter doing? He's hosting the first community group. He's inviting his friends. Jesus is there at the communion group. I don't know if they have some snacks. And they're having a good time. And by the way, this is a great plug for community groups. So if you are not in a community group, it is imperative for you to join a community group. They're awesome. My community group, this week we had 26 people. And you say, "Wow." Well, I always start by counting my family, that's six, six eternal souls. And then, there's another family that has three kids, so that's 11. But we do welcome, we got 25-plus community groups all around the city. We'd love for you to sign up and to join. And just a reminder, it's also a great place to invite those who are not Christians. Sometimes people feel a little self-conscious or insecure about coming to a large group gathering, but in a small setting, especially friends, neighbors, invite them, especially with the Gospel of Mark, this is a tremendous series for you to invite your friends to community groups and to church. So verse two, "And many were gathered together so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was preaching the word to them." So the full house. What's he doing? He's preaching the good news, the arrival, and dominion of God is here. And then verse three, "And they came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him. And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay." Roofs in the dwellings of common people in Israel were made of wooden beams placed across stone or mud brick walls. And the beams were covered with reeds, thorns, several inches of clay. So Jesus is preaching, and all of a sudden, there's dust falling on his head. I wonder what Peter's feeling. Like, "Oh." And by the way, Jesus completely invades his life, that's how Jesus works. When you welcome Jesus into your life, he invades, he dominates. So the roof is falling apart, stuff's falling from the ceiling. And this is just a reminder that it is a sacrifice to welcome people into your house. Hospitality takes work, that's why Peter says, "Be hospitable without grumbling." Why does he say that? If you have been hospitable, you know exactly why he said that. I remember, recently, I repainted my apartment, repainted beautiful. The very first community group, three boys walk in with a basketball like, "Oh no." Scuffed up all my walls, and I was like, "Come on." But I use the best paint, Benjamin Moore, you just wipe it off. But it is a sacrifice, but it's worth it. It's worth it because these gentlemen love their friends so much, their paralytic friend, they know that God can heal him, Jesus can heal him, Jesus has the power to do it. They take Peter's roof apart, unroof the roof, Scripture says, and they lower him down. Verse five, "And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.'" Jesus saw their faith, he doesn't see the paralytics' faith. The emphasis here is he saw their faith, they believed on behalf of their friend. The friend's faith isn't emphasized here, perhaps it's because he has been paralyzed, not just physically, but he is paralyzed spiritually. And that's why Jesus starts the healing process by saying, "Son, your sins are forgiven." It was their faith in Jesus leading to action, initiative to overcome obstacles that changes this man's life. And here, I just want to point out that sharing the good news, sometimes it takes teamwork, four-on-one. If you have an unbelieving friend, get three Christian friends, a four-on-one, it's more effective because they ask questions if you don't know the answer, the other person knows the answer, but then, you have some time to think and you just go back and forth. And that's what they're doing here. And Jesus is impressed by their faith in action, and that's true faith. Truth faith is always an action. And Jesus perceived their improvisation as an expression of faith. Mark loves using the word immediately, he uses it all the time, 41 times in the book, immediately, immediately, immediately. And this one text where it's clearly you just need the word immediately, it's not there. And I've been meditating on the fact, why didn't they wait? Why didn't they wait until Jesus is done preaching? Why didn't they wait until he leaves the house? My working theory is that Jesus sermons just took forever and he just preached and preached and preached. But also, I think they felt an urgency from the Holy Spirit that we have to do it and we have to do this now. And I do, I pray that the Lord impresses that urgency upon us to share the gospel with our friends who don't yet know the Lord. And we are to tell them to strive, this is what these gentlemen are doing. Luke 13, it says, "Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. When once the master of the house has risen and shut the door and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door saying, 'Lord, open to us,' then he will answer you, 'I do not know where you come from.'" There is an urgency because we don't know how much time is left, we don't know how much time anyone of us has left, therefore, "Today," Scripture says, "Today is the day of repentance." Today is the day to turn from sins to turn to Christ. Jesus says, "Son, your sins are forgiven." Whatever the expectation of these gentlemen, Jesus is addressing, not this man's felt need, his obvious felt need was healing of his legs, but he has a need that is greater than even that. His deepest need, his most pressing need was that he has transgressed God's law, God's holy law and God is holy. And after all, what's the value of the use of all our limbs if we continue to yield our members as instruments of sin? What good if after having restored his health, the man remains under wrath and the curse of God? And Jesus calls him child, my son. Here he is showing us that this is the relationship that God has for us. He wants to forgive us of our sins and to make us children of the Father. Sin is presented here as the obstacle to healing and sin and sickness are very closely connected in Scripture. 2 Chronicles 7:14, "If my people who are called by my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land." In the Old Testament, transgression can lead to illness. Deuteronomy 28 lists out blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience. Therefore, healing and forgiveness are often closely related to each other. Isaiah 38:16, "Oh Lord, by these things men live and in all these is the life of my spirit. Oh, restore to me health and make me live. Behold, it was for my welfare that I had great bitterness but in love you have delivered my life from the pit of destruction for you have cast all my sins behind your back." In places, the terms are even interchangeable, we see heal and forgive almost as if you can just replace them. Psalm 41:3, "The Lord sustains him on his sick bed. In his illness, you restore him to full health. As for me, I said, 'Oh Lord, be gracious to me. Heal me for I have sinned against you." And Jesus himself links disease with sin and healing with forgiveness. In John 5, he heals a gentleman there who also could not walk and then, Jesus finds him after, in John 5:14, he says, "Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, 'See, you are well, sin no more that nothing worse may happen to you.'" But of course, we have to balance this out with John 9. And John 9, the disciples are walking and they see, it says, "As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, 'Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?' Jesus answered, 'It is not that this man's sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.'" The Bible never says that we suffer in relation to how much we have sinned, and many times God calls the righteous to suffer and allows the wicked to prosper. And this is part of his purpose and remains a mystery to us. But we do know if the Lord allows seasons of suffering for us, it's always with a purpose. In Luke 13:1-5 says, "There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, 'Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those 18 on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you'll all likewise perish.'" The point is that we do not necessarily suffer or get sick and direct proportion to our sins. We live in a fallen world. We're all born guilty of Adam's sin. We all have a corrupt, sinful nature, and we all commit acts of sin which may or may not bring down God's punishment upon us. Therefore, our sin, in Adam, lies at the root of all our suffering. This is what Jesus' point is that he wants to forgive sins, and that begins the process of our total restoration. Our total restoration begins with forgiveness. Point three is the King is questioned, this is verse six of Mark 2. "Now, some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts." The scribes were the so-called teachers of the law, they were the specialist in the interpretation of the law, the application of it in particular situations or disputes. And these men, it shows that they continually challenged Jesus' teaching and his authority. They did not approve of his message. They didn't approve of him because he didn't go to them for credentials, he didn't go to them for permission, and he's not part of their established big religion, if you will. And so, the opposition here asserts itself. In chapter one, Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness for 40 days. He won, he overcame. And then, Jesus goes into the synagogue. As soon as he starts preaching, a demon begins to interfere with Jesus' teaching, and Jesus casts out the demon from the gentlemen. And here, we see in chapter two, and this is through chapter three, that these Jewish religious leaders, the scribes, members of the sect of the Pharisees, they come as representatives of Satan, as servants of Satan because they are doing Satan's bidding. In being against Christ, they are actually doing the work of Satan. Though routed for a moment by Jesus' exorcisms and his healings, the demons now counter-attack Jesus through human instruments with special fierceness. Why? Because they know that Jesus has come to destroy the works of the evil one and they know that their time is short. Revelation 12:12 says, "Therefore, rejoice o heavens and you who dwell in them, but woe to you o earth and sea for the devil has come down to you in great wrath because he knows that his time is short." So this counter-attack takes the form of arguments with the scribes and the Pharisees and it always begins with the question why? "Why do you speak like this? Why do you and your disciples don't fast like John and his disciples do? Why are you doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?" And Jesus responds to each objection in a forceful manner. It's not wrong to ask questions, it's fine. The Lord actually says, come, let us consider, let us think, let us meditate. But here, they're not asking questions, they're questioning. It's a negative word, connotation of calculations only used in the negative sense and they're questioning in their heart. And Jesus sees the heart, he knows exactly what's going on. So in verse seven, they say, "Why does this man speak like that? He's blaspheming. Who can forgive sins but God alone?" Who can forgive sins but God alone? And this is true, only God can forgive sins. Only the one that was sinned against can forgive sins and that's why God is the one that forgives sins, it's his prerogative. Exodus 34:6-9, "The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, 'The Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding and steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation.' And Moses quickly bowed down his head toward the earth and worshiped. And he said, If now I have found favor in your sight, oh Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us for is a stiff-necked people and pardon our iniquity and our sin and take us for your inheritance.'" Isaiah 43:25, "I am he who bloats out your transgressions for my own sake and I will not remember your sins." So by forgiving the man's sins, what is Jesus doing? He's revealing that he is God. "Your sins are forgiven. Because you're the one who sinned against me, I am the one that can forgive you." He's proving that he is God. By saying, "How can you say this? No one can forgive sins except one, that is God," they're appealing to the Shema, the Great Shema, this is Deuteronomy 6:4-5, "Hear o Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength." Verse eight, "Immediately, Jesus perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves said to them, 'Why do you question these things in your hearts?'" Later, he's going to prove that he has the power for forgive sins by actually healing the gentleman, but here, he proves that he's God by reading their minds. He knows exactly what they're thinking in their hearts. 1 Samuel 16:7 says, "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature because I have rejected him for the Lord sees not as man sees man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart." Verse nine, it continues, "Which is easier to say to the paralytic, 'Your sins are forgiven, or to say, 'Rise, take up your bed and walk'?" And here, you got to pause and say, which is easier? From the standpoint of systematic theology, it may be simpler to perform a miraculous cure for God than to forgive a person's sins. We'll get to that in a bit. But in terms of external proof to these people who are questioning Jesus, it's easier to say your sins are forgiven because no one knows. Who knows if the person's sins are forgiven? It's a lot harder to do a miracle and outside observers have no immediate way of knowing if the sins are forgiven, whereas you can immediately verify a miraculous cure. So Jesus' ability to heal the gentleman is an argument from greater to lesser. If Jesus can do the greater, which is healing the paralytic, he can do the easier from the human perspective of forgiving his sins and the miracle thus confirms the claim to forgive sins. If the man is healed, there can be only one conclusion, that Jesus is God, that he has authority to forgive sins and both the healing and the forgiveness of sins are sure sign that Jesus is God and Jesus is king. But which is easier from God's perspective? The miracle is easier because God created everything just by speaking, he could speak and the man's legs are immediately healed. But to forgive this man's sins requires so much more than just a mere utterance of the word, it would require the greatest thing that has ever been done by God himself. It will take more to forgive this man's sins than to create the entire universe. All God did to create everything was speak, recreating the man's legs, so easy for God. But to forgive this man's sins required the father sending the Son who took on flesh and took the working of the Holy Spirit, all three to undergo terrible suffering. Yes, Jesus Christ suffered in this life, and yes, he suffered on the cross, but the Father suffered also in allowing all of that to happen, the Father suffered in bringing down his wrath on the Son, the Holy Spirit suffered as well. Forgiveness of our sins requires nothing less than the incarnation, the suffering, the humiliation, and finally, the crucifixion of the Son of God. All of this required to forgive even one man of his sins. God created everything just by speaking, but to recreate us from the inside out, it took the gospel, it took the cross. And this is what Jesus did, and this is what Jesus offers us. Mark 2:10, "But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, 'I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home." The phrase "that you may know" is a phrase that's repeated often in the Exodus account. When Moses stands in front of Pharaoh, in his confrontation, he says, God's going to send miracles and he's going to send these curses that you may know. This is Exodus 9:13 and 14, "Then the Lord said to Moses, rise up early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh and say to him, 'Thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, let my people go that they may serve me, for this time, I will send all my plagues on you yourself and on your servants and your people so that you may know that there is none like me in all the earth.'" And what's fascinating is this divine oracle that you may know, that same phrase that was used against Pharaoh is now his prophetic judgment against Israel's own religious leaders. The Son of Man, it's a divine term for the Messiah from Daniel 7, and he has the authority, he has the power to forgive us. Verse 12, "And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all so that they were all amazed and glorified God saying, 'We never saw anything like this.'" The healing establishes the reality of the forgiveness, and it's the sure sign that Jesus is the king, the king has come and the Messianic age has dawned as promised and prophesied in Isaiah 35:5, "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped, then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy." The people here of Capernaum were witnessing incredible miracle. It says that they were amazed. They've never seen anything like it. They see the first reverberations of the messianic kingdom of King Jesus. And indeed, throughout the Gospels, we see that Jesus healed all manner of sickness and disease. And the miracles that are emphasized are emphasized for a reason. When Jesus heals a leper, this means that Jesus can remove the uncleanness of sin and corruption from us. When Jesus gives sight to the blind, he's showing us that those who believe in him now see things from God's perspective and Jesus gives spiritual eyesight through faith. When Jesus restores hearing to the deaf, he's demonstrating that he is the one who can give people the ability to hear God's word and understand its meaning and know that it's true. And when Jesus enables the lame to walk, he's showing us that we must follow him. When Jesus resurrects Lazarus in verse 25 of John 11, "Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?' She said to him, 'Yes Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who is coming into the world.'" In other words, the miracles that we see in the Gospels aren't just meant to impress us or impress people, rather they are signs and pictures that those who believe in God's promises, those promises are true and they will come to pass. In this sense, the greatest miracle of Christianity isn't just the fact that Jesus does miracles, the greatest miracle is that we can be saved. But also, miracles don't just increase people's faith, for some people, if they see the miracle and they turn from it, it serves as damnation for them. I wonder how many people from Capernaum actually believed in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior? How many people followed him as a king? And not many. I think it's not many. And we see this in particular in Matthew 11:20-30 where Jesus includes the miracles in Capernaum as actually damnation against them. "Then he began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done because they did not repent. 'Woe to you Chorazin, woe to you Bethsaida for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You'll be brought down to Hades for if the mighty works done and you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I tell you that it will be more tolerable on that day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you.' At that time, Jesus declared, 'I thank you, father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children. Yes, father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my father. And no one knows the son except the Father. And no one knows the Father except the son and anyone to whom the son chooses to reveal him. Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I'm gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.'" So friends, today, as you hear the word of God, we call you to repentance, call you to faith in Jesus Christ. And because Jesus Christ forgives sin, healing is guaranteed to all Christians. And that sounds shocking, but God has forgiven you through the shed blood and perfect righteousness of Jesus. And God has even healed some of you, perhaps miraculously through natural means or supernatural means. And God has seen you through every trial which has been brought into your life. And God will heal every one of us, if not in this life, then certainly, at the great day of resurrection. Why? Because you are forgiven of sin, you will be healed. So have you been forgiven of your sins by Jesus Christ? If you don't answer with a resounding yes, then today, right now, as we pray and as we worship, pray in your heart. Lord Jesus cleanse me from my sin. Lord Jesus, heal me of my spiritual paralysis. Wherever in your life you can't follow Jesus because you are just chained by sin today, say, "Lord, free me from that paralysis. Draw me to yourself and put me to work in the kingdom of God." Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly father, we thank you for this incredible text and I thank you for revealing your power. And I thank you that you offer us the revelation of your person, that you give us the gift of repentance and you offer us forgiveness of sins. And that's the beginning of our complete and total restoration. And I pray, Lord, fill each one of us with the Spirit. And give us a zeal, a passion for our friends, our neighbors, our loved ones who don't yet know you, are paralyzed by sin. And I pray that you give us the zeal to do everything we can to draw them to you, bring them to you, to answer their questions, to bring them to scriptures so that they also are given the gift of repentance and the forgiveness of sins. And Lord, we pray for your spirit to be poured out on this church and upon this city, and we pray for great revival and I pray that you use us in the process and we pray all this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Supernatural & Revelation

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 24, 2023 48:46


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Welcome to this space. Every once in a while, I'm glad that we worship down here, it's to keep us humble, keep us grounded, and to remind us that the space upstairs really is a blessing. We're continuing our sermon series called Kingdom Come through the Gospel of Mark: The Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom. The title today is Supernatural and Revelation. So Jesus Christ has come as a king, and in chapter one, he was anointed by the Holy Spirit and the King comes preaching that the kingdom is here, the kingdom has been established with the coming of the King. Therefore, what are we to do? We are to repent of sin, believe in him and follow him and live for the King. Jesus Christ did come performing supernatural miracles for the purpose of revelation to reveal that he is the Son of God and he performed what only God can do. Only God can forgive sins, and that's what Jesus does. He cast out demons, he heals the sick, he even resurrects the dead. And what's fascinating is that the contemporaries of Jesus Christ, those who saw his miracles, those who experienced his power, most of them did not believe in Jesus Christ, they did not have their sins forgiven. And it wasn't until the day of Pentecost, St. Peter's filled with the Holy Spirit, he has the indwelling power of the Spirit and he preaches to these same people and he preaches to people who have seen the miracles of Christ, have heard his sermons, seen his crucifixion, heard about his resurrection, but they weren't saved. The miracles did not convert their hearts, they didn't yet have their sins forgiven and their hearts were still hardened by sin, in disbelief. In Acts 2:22, Peter says, "Men of Israel, hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, losing the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it." And it's not until they realize that they have sinned against Jesus Christ, the Holy One of God, that they're cut to the heart. This is Acts 2:37, "Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, 'Brothers, what shall we do?' And Peter said to them, 'Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit for the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.' And with many other words, he bore witness and continue to exhort them, saying, 'Save yourselves from this crooked generation.' So those who received the word were baptized and there were added that day about 3000 souls." So the Apostle Peter responsible for much, if not most of the material of the Gospel of Mark, he presents the miracles of Jesus Christ in such a way that they attest to who Jesus is. He is the King and he offers us, every single one of us, the greatest miracle, the miracle of all miracles, salvation by grace through faith, forgiveness of sin and entrance into the Kingdom of God. And in our text today, we see that Jesus heals a leper and he heals a paralytic, but only one of these men walks away with his sins forgiven. And the question posed before us is, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul, forfeit his soul? What's the point of being healed of paralysis if you then use your legs to serve sin and Satan? What does the profit a man to gain pristine skin in this life while being tormented in hell for eternity? So Mark 1:40 through 2:12, would you look at the text with me? "And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling, said to him, 'If you will, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will. Be clean.' And immediately, the leprosy left him and he was made clean. And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once and said to him, 'See that you say nothing to anyone, but go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for proof to them.' But he went out and began to talk freely about it and to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places and people were coming to Him from every quarter. And when he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. And many were gathered together so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was preaching the word to them. And they came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. And when they could not get near because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him. And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay. And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytics, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.' Now some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts, 'Why does this man speak like that? He's blaspheming, who can forgive sins but God alone?' And immediately, Jesus perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves said to them, 'Why do you question these things in your hearts? Which is easier to say the paralytic, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Rise, take up your bed and walk'? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, 'I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home.'' And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all so that they were all amazed and glorified God saying, 'We never saw anything like this.'" This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word, may he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, the King is used. Second, the King is sought. And third, the King is questioned. First, the King is used. In Mark 1:40, the gentleman is characterized as a leper. He has a scale disease and this term designates a variety of conditions in which the skin becomes scaly, but not what today is called leprosy or Hansen's disease. But in Leviticus 13 and 14, this skin disorder was treated as a grave danger to the purity of the community. So sufferers were regarded, in effect, as corpses, walking dead, and physical contact with them produced the same sort of defilement as touching dead bodies. Leviticus 13:45 say, "The leprous person who has the disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose. He shall cover his upper lip and cry out, 'Unclean. Unclean.' And he shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp." So the disease was serious and also, it rendered the person socially as an outcast. Josephus, the ancient Jewish historian, he said that the disease, those with it were treated as, in effect, walking dead. And if anyone is healed, it was as if someone dead was raised to life. If the person so much has stuck their head in someone else's house, the house was rendered unclean. So the person has been suffering, he's been suffering for a long time, both physically and socially, and what happens is he hears that Jesus Christ has come, he has power and he has been healing people. And the man, immediately, boldly comes to Jesus Christ, it says imploring him, pleading with him. And it's followed by kneeling. So he's entreating with the most earnest urgency, he's crying out, "If you will, you can make me clean." And first, this is great. This is a great start. And pain does this often, suffering does this often. God often allows us to go through seasons of suffering. C.S. Lewis says that pain is God's megaphone to wake us up. So he has pain, he goes to the one that can alleviate the pain and he implores him. And with humility, he asks, "If you will, you can heal me," that, "You have the power." So we see even faith here. In verse 41, it says, "Jesus is moved with pity," in the English Standard Version, "he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, 'I will, be clean.'" Now, if you are reading along in your Bible, most likely, there's a footnote right there at that word, moved with pity or moved with compassion. So this is a question of which word is original. There is a textual question here. The oldest manuscripts that we have do not say moved with pity, it says moved with anger. And if the word was compassion, most likely, in the parallel, Matthew and Luke and the story, that word would've been used, it is not. And if you study textual criticism, you get to text like this, you got to ask why would a scribe change the word? Most likely an overzealous scribe here, read the word anger, Jesus is angry, and he can't believe in an angry Jesus and so, he changed the word to compassion. But I do see an anger here. I do see the indignation of Christ here, a similar indignation to where Jesus, it says, was indignant in John 11 about the death of Lazarus. He was deeply moved in the spirit and greatly troubled. So perhaps there is anger here, we'll see why. And Jesus does stretch out his hand, certainly compassionately, and he touches this man, the Greek pronoun him is left out. So He just stretched out and touched this person, shocking to anyone seeing this because you weren't supposed to touch a leper. Jesus touches the leper, and instead of the impurity passing from the man to Jesus, Jesus's power overcomes the impurity and disease. In verse 42, "And immediately, the leprosy left him and he was made clean. And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once." Sternly charged, it's a word that means growling, it refers to the snorting of a horse. And as applied to human beings, it means to express indignation by explosive expulsion of breath. And I think that's biblical, whenever I'm in traffic, that's how I breathe with this expulsion of breath. My wife rubs my arm and I feel better. And then, he uses the word to send out, ballo. And it's the same word that Jesus used to exercise demons. So it was like casting this man out. He ejects the person from his presence and then he charges him, verse 44, "And said to him, 'See that you say nothing to anyone, but go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for a proof to them.'" And what he's referring to is Leviticus 14, if you have been healed, you are to bring three lambs or one lamb and four birds depending on a person's wealth. And as proof to them, as proof to the priesthood that Jesus has come with the power of God. What does the gentleman do in verse 45? "But he went out and began to talk freely about it, to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer openly enter town, but was out in desolate places and people were coming to him from every quarter." And what an amazing, wondrous moment this must've been for the gentleman, having lived for so long, ostracized by society, no human contact. He had lived in isolation for years perhaps, and pain without a single touch of a human hand. What does he want to do? He wants to immediately go show his family, show his friends that he has been healed. And you say, "This is great." This is like, "Jesus, you healed the person. He's basically a walking advertisement to your power. Don't you want him to go and preach about you?" And Jesus didn't want him to because Jesus knew that the substance of the man's message is going to be come to Jesus as the miracle worker, come get this blessing, come get healing from Jesus. And Jesus doesn't want just to heal our bodies, he doesn't just want to meet our physical needs. No, Jesus has come to preach the word, to convert our hearts, to regenerate us, and to save our souls. And what we see here is that the word, but to contrast, Jesus said, don't do this, and the word but is saying he went directly against the orders of King Jesus. Jesus' anger may also stem from the fact that the man completely disobeyed Jesus' instructions. The ability of Jesus to heal now becomes the cause of his inability to move about. Jesus came to preach, he came to preach the gospel and now he can't do that. So he ends up in a desolate place, it says. And this is fascinating because that gentleman had to live in a desolate place, he had to live away from people, he gets healed. And then, right after the healing, Jesus is the one in the desolate place. And what's the text showing us? It's showing us that Jesus exchanged places with the leper. Jesus is saying, "Not only am I willing for you to be clean, I'm willing to make myself unclean for you." And this is really at the heart of the gospel. It's the double imputation, Jesus gets our sin, we get Jesus' righteousness. 2 Corinthians 5:21, "For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might be become the righteousness of God." Galatians 3:13, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who's hanged on a tree,' so that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the gentiles so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith." Instead of repenting and believing in the content of Jesus' preaching, the man disobeys Jesus tells everyone that Jesus had healed him, which makes it more difficult for Jesus to preach the gospel. The poor man was so thankful to be healed, but he missed the whole point. What was the point? The point was that he had a deeper uncleanness, he had a deeper leprosy, he had an issue that separated him, not just from the people of God, but from God himself. And he receives the skin healing, but he doesn't receive the heart healing. His faith is only skin deep. He did the right things, he came to Christ, he implored, he kneeled, he begged, he received, and then, he walked away only to disobey the king, revealing that he has not received the cleansing of his soul from sin. God does miracles, God does miracles even today, but the miracles always have a purpose, it's always to attest to the person of God. And unless we repent of sin, those miracles aren't going to do anything for us, not spiritually speaking, not eternally speaking. So when we do experience seasons of pain, when we do go through difficulties, yes, do go to the Lord, yes, beg for the Lord's healing, but stay there, stay with the Lord, stay obeying the Lord. We had a nice lady that came to our community group for quite some time. And she said, "I don't believe. I don't believe. I'm here, just you guys are nice people." And I was like, "Okay, keep coming." And she said, "I don't believe because there's too much suffering in the world. How can a good God allow so much suffering in the world?" And that day at community group, she's like, "For example, there's a hurricane coming directly at Mexico right now and it's going to absolutely decimate Mexico and thousands of people are going to die. Where's your God now?" I was like, "Look, I don't know. Let's pray. Let's pray. Let's pray for a miracle for the hurricane to change directions. Let's pray. The Spirit blows where it wishes, so does the wind." So we pray, we fervently prayed, prayed zealously. And I remember that just like... The next day, what does the hurricane do? The next day the hurricane completely changed its trajectory, completely misses Mexico. And I was like, "Oh yeah, I can't wait for community group. She's going to come in extra saved." And then, she comes to the group, pretends nothing happened. And I was like, "Remember our prayer request?" She's like, "It was a coincidence." I'm like, "No. Oh, my goodness. There's no such thing as a coincidence." Miracles don't save anyone. God does do miracles, but there is a passage where a rich man dies, and a gentleman named Lazarus goes to heaven. And the rich man says, "Lord, please, Father Abraham, resurrect Lazarus, bring him back so my brothers don't end up in this place of torment." And what does the Lord say? The Lord says, "Even if someone comes back from the dead, they're not going to believe." It's not enough. I've seen people experience the power of God in their life and then I've seen them walk away. During COVID, we had a gentleman that came to service. You could tell something was wrong and he's like, "I think I have a demon. Can you please pray for the Lord to cast out the demon from me?" I prayed. His body language completely changed. He received forgiveness from the Lord. And then, I gave him my number. And then, he just disappeared. He received a gift from Lord, disappeared. And then, I found out that he went back to his sinful lifestyle instead of repenting and following the Lord. So don't allow your faith to just stay there at the physical level or at the skin level, no, follow the Lord and ask for the greater healing, which is that of having sins forgiven. Point two is the king is sought, Mark 2:1, "And when he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home." So Jesus returns to Capernaum, that's his base of operations for the early portion of his ministry. And it says he was at home, whose home is this? And scripture doesn't say that Jesus had a house. Most likely, this is Peter's house because Jesus called Peter in chapter one, "Follow me." And then, Peter says, "Where are we going?" And Jesus ends up at his house. "Follow me to your house because that's now my house." And this is how Jesus operates. When Jesus forgives you of your sins, he is now your king. You and everything you have now belongs to the king, in service to the king. So Peter's house, what is Peter doing? He's hosting the first community group. He's inviting his friends. Jesus is there at the communion group. I don't know if they have some snacks. And they're having a good time. And by the way, this is a great plug for community groups. So if you are not in a community group, it is imperative for you to join a community group. They're awesome. My community group, this week we had 26 people. And you say, "Wow." Well, I always start by counting my family, that's six, six eternal souls. And then, there's another family that has three kids, so that's 11. But we do welcome, we got 25-plus community groups all around the city. We'd love for you to sign up and to join. And just a reminder, it's also a great place to invite those who are not Christians. Sometimes people feel a little self-conscious or insecure about coming to a large group gathering, but in a small setting, especially friends, neighbors, invite them, especially with the Gospel of Mark, this is a tremendous series for you to invite your friends to community groups and to church. So verse two, "And many were gathered together so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was preaching the word to them." So the full house. What's he doing? He's preaching the good news, the arrival, and dominion of God is here. And then verse three, "And they came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him. And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay." Roofs in the dwellings of common people in Israel were made of wooden beams placed across stone or mud brick walls. And the beams were covered with reeds, thorns, several inches of clay. So Jesus is preaching, and all of a sudden, there's dust falling on his head. I wonder what Peter's feeling. Like, "Oh." And by the way, Jesus completely invades his life, that's how Jesus works. When you welcome Jesus into your life, he invades, he dominates. So the roof is falling apart, stuff's falling from the ceiling. And this is just a reminder that it is a sacrifice to welcome people into your house. Hospitality takes work, that's why Peter says, "Be hospitable without grumbling." Why does he say that? If you have been hospitable, you know exactly why he said that. I remember, recently, I repainted my apartment, repainted beautiful. The very first community group, three boys walk in with a basketball like, "Oh no." Scuffed up all my walls, and I was like, "Come on." But I use the best paint, Benjamin Moore, you just wipe it off. But it is a sacrifice, but it's worth it. It's worth it because these gentlemen love their friends so much, their paralytic friend, they know that God can heal him, Jesus can heal him, Jesus has the power to do it. They take Peter's roof apart, unroof the roof, Scripture says, and they lower him down. Verse five, "And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.'" Jesus saw their faith, he doesn't see the paralytics' faith. The emphasis here is he saw their faith, they believed on behalf of their friend. The friend's faith isn't emphasized here, perhaps it's because he has been paralyzed, not just physically, but he is paralyzed spiritually. And that's why Jesus starts the healing process by saying, "Son, your sins are forgiven." It was their faith in Jesus leading to action, initiative to overcome obstacles that changes this man's life. And here, I just want to point out that sharing the good news, sometimes it takes teamwork, four-on-one. If you have an unbelieving friend, get three Christian friends, a four-on-one, it's more effective because they ask questions if you don't know the answer, the other person knows the answer, but then, you have some time to think and you just go back and forth. And that's what they're doing here. And Jesus is impressed by their faith in action, and that's true faith. Truth faith is always an action. And Jesus perceived their improvisation as an expression of faith. Mark loves using the word immediately, he uses it all the time, 41 times in the book, immediately, immediately, immediately. And this one text where it's clearly you just need the word immediately, it's not there. And I've been meditating on the fact, why didn't they wait? Why didn't they wait until Jesus is done preaching? Why didn't they wait until he leaves the house? My working theory is that Jesus sermons just took forever and he just preached and preached and preached. But also, I think they felt an urgency from the Holy Spirit that we have to do it and we have to do this now. And I do, I pray that the Lord impresses that urgency upon us to share the gospel with our friends who don't yet know the Lord. And we are to tell them to strive, this is what these gentlemen are doing. Luke 13, it says, "Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. When once the master of the house has risen and shut the door and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door saying, 'Lord, open to us,' then he will answer you, 'I do not know where you come from.'" There is an urgency because we don't know how much time is left, we don't know how much time anyone of us has left, therefore, "Today," Scripture says, "Today is the day of repentance." Today is the day to turn from sins to turn to Christ. Jesus says, "Son, your sins are forgiven." Whatever the expectation of these gentlemen, Jesus is addressing, not this man's felt need, his obvious felt need was healing of his legs, but he has a need that is greater than even that. His deepest need, his most pressing need was that he has transgressed God's law, God's holy law and God is holy. And after all, what's the value of the use of all our limbs if we continue to yield our members as instruments of sin? What good if after having restored his health, the man remains under wrath and the curse of God? And Jesus calls him child, my son. Here he is showing us that this is the relationship that God has for us. He wants to forgive us of our sins and to make us children of the Father. Sin is presented here as the obstacle to healing and sin and sickness are very closely connected in Scripture. 2 Chronicles 7:14, "If my people who are called by my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land." In the Old Testament, transgression can lead to illness. Deuteronomy 28 lists out blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience. Therefore, healing and forgiveness are often closely related to each other. Isaiah 38:16, "Oh Lord, by these things men live and in all these is the life of my spirit. Oh, restore to me health and make me live. Behold, it was for my welfare that I had great bitterness but in love you have delivered my life from the pit of destruction for you have cast all my sins behind your back." In places, the terms are even interchangeable, we see heal and forgive almost as if you can just replace them. Psalm 41:3, "The Lord sustains him on his sick bed. In his illness, you restore him to full health. As for me, I said, 'Oh Lord, be gracious to me. Heal me for I have sinned against you." And Jesus himself links disease with sin and healing with forgiveness. In John 5, he heals a gentleman there who also could not walk and then, Jesus finds him after, in John 5:14, he says, "Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, 'See, you are well, sin no more that nothing worse may happen to you.'" But of course, we have to balance this out with John 9. And John 9, the disciples are walking and they see, it says, "As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, 'Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?' Jesus answered, 'It is not that this man's sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.'" The Bible never says that we suffer in relation to how much we have sinned, and many times God calls the righteous to suffer and allows the wicked to prosper. And this is part of his purpose and remains a mystery to us. But we do know if the Lord allows seasons of suffering for us, it's always with a purpose. In Luke 13:1-5 says, "There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, 'Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those 18 on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you'll all likewise perish.'" The point is that we do not necessarily suffer or get sick and direct proportion to our sins. We live in a fallen world. We're all born guilty of Adam's sin. We all have a corrupt, sinful nature, and we all commit acts of sin which may or may not bring down God's punishment upon us. Therefore, our sin, in Adam, lies at the root of all our suffering. This is what Jesus' point is that he wants to forgive sins, and that begins the process of our total restoration. Our total restoration begins with forgiveness. Point three is the King is questioned, this is verse six of Mark 2. "Now, some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts." The scribes were the so-called teachers of the law, they were the specialist in the interpretation of the law, the application of it in particular situations or disputes. And these men, it shows that they continually challenged Jesus' teaching and his authority. They did not approve of his message. They didn't approve of him because he didn't go to them for credentials, he didn't go to them for permission, and he's not part of their established big religion, if you will. And so, the opposition here asserts itself. In chapter one, Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness for 40 days. He won, he overcame. And then, Jesus goes into the synagogue. As soon as he starts preaching, a demon begins to interfere with Jesus' teaching, and Jesus casts out the demon from the gentlemen. And here, we see in chapter two, and this is through chapter three, that these Jewish religious leaders, the scribes, members of the sect of the Pharisees, they come as representatives of Satan, as servants of Satan because they are doing Satan's bidding. In being against Christ, they are actually doing the work of Satan. Though routed for a moment by Jesus' exorcisms and his healings, the demons now counter-attack Jesus through human instruments with special fierceness. Why? Because they know that Jesus has come to destroy the works of the evil one and they know that their time is short. Revelation 12:12 says, "Therefore, rejoice o heavens and you who dwell in them, but woe to you o earth and sea for the devil has come down to you in great wrath because he knows that his time is short." So this counter-attack takes the form of arguments with the scribes and the Pharisees and it always begins with the question why? "Why do you speak like this? Why do you and your disciples don't fast like John and his disciples do? Why are you doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?" And Jesus responds to each objection in a forceful manner. It's not wrong to ask questions, it's fine. The Lord actually says, come, let us consider, let us think, let us meditate. But here, they're not asking questions, they're questioning. It's a negative word, connotation of calculations only used in the negative sense and they're questioning in their heart. And Jesus sees the heart, he knows exactly what's going on. So in verse seven, they say, "Why does this man speak like that? He's blaspheming. Who can forgive sins but God alone?" Who can forgive sins but God alone? And this is true, only God can forgive sins. Only the one that was sinned against can forgive sins and that's why God is the one that forgives sins, it's his prerogative. Exodus 34:6-9, "The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, 'The Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding and steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation.' And Moses quickly bowed down his head toward the earth and worshiped. And he said, If now I have found favor in your sight, oh Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us for is a stiff-necked people and pardon our iniquity and our sin and take us for your inheritance.'" Isaiah 43:25, "I am he who bloats out your transgressions for my own sake and I will not remember your sins." So by forgiving the man's sins, what is Jesus doing? He's revealing that he is God. "Your sins are forgiven. Because you're the one who sinned against me, I am the one that can forgive you." He's proving that he is God. By saying, "How can you say this? No one can forgive sins except one, that is God," they're appealing to the Shema, the Great Shema, this is Deuteronomy 6:4-5, "Hear o Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength." Verse eight, "Immediately, Jesus perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves said to them, 'Why do you question these things in your hearts?'" Later, he's going to prove that he has the power for forgive sins by actually healing the gentleman, but here, he proves that he's God by reading their minds. He knows exactly what they're thinking in their hearts. 1 Samuel 16:7 says, "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature because I have rejected him for the Lord sees not as man sees man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart." Verse nine, it continues, "Which is easier to say to the paralytic, 'Your sins are forgiven, or to say, 'Rise, take up your bed and walk'?" And here, you got to pause and say, which is easier? From the standpoint of systematic theology, it may be simpler to perform a miraculous cure for God than to forgive a person's sins. We'll get to that in a bit. But in terms of external proof to these people who are questioning Jesus, it's easier to say your sins are forgiven because no one knows. Who knows if the person's sins are forgiven? It's a lot harder to do a miracle and outside observers have no immediate way of knowing if the sins are forgiven, whereas you can immediately verify a miraculous cure. So Jesus' ability to heal the gentleman is an argument from greater to lesser. If Jesus can do the greater, which is healing the paralytic, he can do the easier from the human perspective of forgiving his sins and the miracle thus confirms the claim to forgive sins. If the man is healed, there can be only one conclusion, that Jesus is God, that he has authority to forgive sins and both the healing and the forgiveness of sins are sure sign that Jesus is God and Jesus is king. But which is easier from God's perspective? The miracle is easier because God created everything just by speaking, he could speak and the man's legs are immediately healed. But to forgive this man's sins requires so much more than just a mere utterance of the word, it would require the greatest thing that has ever been done by God himself. It will take more to forgive this man's sins than to create the entire universe. All God did to create everything was speak, recreating the man's legs, so easy for God. But to forgive this man's sins required the father sending the Son who took on flesh and took the working of the Holy Spirit, all three to undergo terrible suffering. Yes, Jesus Christ suffered in this life, and yes, he suffered on the cross, but the Father suffered also in allowing all of that to happen, the Father suffered in bringing down his wrath on the Son, the Holy Spirit suffered as well. Forgiveness of our sins requires nothing less than the incarnation, the suffering, the humiliation, and finally, the crucifixion of the Son of God. All of this required to forgive even one man of his sins. God created everything just by speaking, but to recreate us from the inside out, it took the gospel, it took the cross. And this is what Jesus did, and this is what Jesus offers us. Mark 2:10, "But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, 'I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home." The phrase "that you may know" is a phrase that's repeated often in the Exodus account. When Moses stands in front of Pharaoh, in his confrontation, he says, God's going to send miracles and he's going to send these curses that you may know. This is Exodus 9:13 and 14, "Then the Lord said to Moses, rise up early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh and say to him, 'Thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, let my people go that they may serve me, for this time, I will send all my plagues on you yourself and on your servants and your people so that you may know that there is none like me in all the earth.'" And what's fascinating is this divine oracle that you may know, that same phrase that was used against Pharaoh is now his prophetic judgment against Israel's own religious leaders. The Son of Man, it's a divine term for the Messiah from Daniel 7, and he has the authority, he has the power to forgive us. Verse 12, "And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all so that they were all amazed and glorified God saying, 'We never saw anything like this.'" The healing establishes the reality of the forgiveness, and it's the sure sign that Jesus is the king, the king has come and the Messianic age has dawned as promised and prophesied in Isaiah 35:5, "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped, then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy." The people here of Capernaum were witnessing incredible miracle. It says that they were amazed. They've never seen anything like it. They see the first reverberations of the messianic kingdom of King Jesus. And indeed, throughout the Gospels, we see that Jesus healed all manner of sickness and disease. And the miracles that are emphasized are emphasized for a reason. When Jesus heals a leper, this means that Jesus can remove the uncleanness of sin and corruption from us. When Jesus gives sight to the blind, he's showing us that those who believe in him now see things from God's perspective and Jesus gives spiritual eyesight through faith. When Jesus restores hearing to the deaf, he's demonstrating that he is the one who can give people the ability to hear God's word and understand its meaning and know that it's true. And when Jesus enables the lame to walk, he's showing us that we must follow him. When Jesus resurrects Lazarus in verse 25 of John 11, "Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?' She said to him, 'Yes Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who is coming into the world.'" In other words, the miracles that we see in the Gospels aren't just meant to impress us or impress people, rather they are signs and pictures that those who believe in God's promises, those promises are true and they will come to pass. In this sense, the greatest miracle of Christianity isn't just the fact that Jesus does miracles, the greatest miracle is that we can be saved. But also, miracles don't just increase people's faith, for some people, if they see the miracle and they turn from it, it serves as damnation for them. I wonder how many people from Capernaum actually believed in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior? How many people followed him as a king? And not many. I think it's not many. And we see this in particular in Matthew 11:20-30 where Jesus includes the miracles in Capernaum as actually damnation against them. "Then he began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done because they did not repent. 'Woe to you Chorazin, woe to you Bethsaida for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You'll be brought down to Hades for if the mighty works done and you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I tell you that it will be more tolerable on that day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you.' At that time, Jesus declared, 'I thank you, father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children. Yes, father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my father. And no one knows the son except the Father. And no one knows the Father except the son and anyone to whom the son chooses to reveal him. Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I'm gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.'" So friends, today, as you hear the word of God, we call you to repentance, call you to faith in Jesus Christ. And because Jesus Christ forgives sin, healing is guaranteed to all Christians. And that sounds shocking, but God has forgiven you through the shed blood and perfect righteousness of Jesus. And God has even healed some of you, perhaps miraculously through natural means or supernatural means. And God has seen you through every trial which has been brought into your life. And God will heal every one of us, if not in this life, then certainly, at the great day of resurrection. Why? Because you are forgiven of sin, you will be healed. So have you been forgiven of your sins by Jesus Christ? If you don't answer with a resounding yes, then today, right now, as we pray and as we worship, pray in your heart. Lord Jesus cleanse me from my sin. Lord Jesus, heal me of my spiritual paralysis. Wherever in your life you can't follow Jesus because you are just chained by sin today, say, "Lord, free me from that paralysis. Draw me to yourself and put me to work in the kingdom of God." Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly father, we thank you for this incredible text and I thank you for revealing your power. And I thank you that you offer us the revelation of your person, that you give us the gift of repentance and you offer us forgiveness of sins. And that's the beginning of our complete and total restoration. And I pray, Lord, fill each one of us with the Spirit. And give us a zeal, a passion for our friends, our neighbors, our loved ones who don't yet know you, are paralyzed by sin. And I pray that you give us the zeal to do everything we can to draw them to you, bring them to you, to answer their questions, to bring them to scriptures so that they also are given the gift of repentance and the forgiveness of sins. And Lord, we pray for your spirit to be poured out on this church and upon this city, and we pray for great revival and I pray that you use us in the process and we pray all this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
The King Came to Preach

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 17, 2023 49:42


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you that you did not leave us in our darkness and rebellion, but because of your great love, your lavish love, the word tells us you sent your beloved Son, your one and only, the holy one of God, the Holy Lamb of God. Jesus, we thank you that you came to establish your kingdom and it's a kingdom that's ruled by your holy word from the inside out. You came preaching the word, and by doing so, you went to battle with Satan and the demonic, battling his lies and battling the confusion that comes with that. Jesus, we thank you that you taught God's word, God's pure, unadulterated, full throttle word. We pray that you make us a people, a church that loves your word, that searches out your word to find eternal life. And we thank you, Jesus, that you fulfilled all the Commandments of God. You fulfilled the will of God perfectly. And then we thank you that you offered yourself as a sacrifice on the cross. And Lord, on the cross, you cried out, "It is finished," because you came not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. And you did that in a perfect life and full of obedience and love. And we thank you Lord that you triumph over Satan's sin and death by your resurrection. And we thank you that through your ascension, you now have taken a seat at the right hand of God, the Father. You went to the cross for the joy that was set before you, the joy of saving souls, redeeming humanity, and for the crown that you were given, a crown to reign and rule over us. We thank you, Jesus, that you're sitting at the right hand of God and you're waiting until all of your enemies have made a footstool for your feet. And you call us into this battle to know your word and to fight the powers of the demonic by the power of your Holy name. Lord, I pray if there's anyone here today who's caught in the nets of sins and the net of the demonic, I pray to release them today. Release them by proclaiming the truth to their hearts and minds, and when they know the truth, the truth will set them free. Lord, make us a people who want to not just learn about you, not just learn about your teachings, but to learn and then to follow you on a daily basis empowered by the Holy Spirit of God, which is given to each one of us when we repent and believe. Lord, bless our time in the Holy Scriptures. We pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We've called the series Kingdom Come: The Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom. The title of the sermon today is the The King Came to Preach. What Mark is doing is he's revealing that Jesus is King. He's the King over everything because he's God incarnate, come to vanquish Satan's sin and death and to reclaim all that is his. One of the effects of the fall when Adam and Eve were created by God, they were placed in the Eden. Everything was beautiful and perfect, and they lived in perfect harmony with nature, with God, and with one another. They believed the lies of the enemy, and by doing so they rejected the word of God. Therefore, they lost dominion of this earth. Satan usurped dominion through his lies. When Jesus comes, he comes to dethroned Satan, and it's fascinating how Jesus comes to establish his kingdom. One would expect that he comes with a host of armies forcing people into submission. He could have done that, but he chooses to come and wage war a different way. Yes, he does fight Satan's temptations. Yes, he does cast out demons, but the focus of Jesus' earthly ministry was countering the lies of Satan, which veiled the minds of human beings. Jesus came to wage a spiritual war, which in many ways was an ideological war. It's a war for truth. It's a war for the truth of who is God? What does he want from us? What are his commands and how are we to follow him? What you believe to be true about God is the battleground. St. Paul comments on this in 2 Corinthians 4:3. "Even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the god of this world," that's Satan, "has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ is Lord with ourselves as your servants, for Jesus' sake. For God who said, let light shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." So it's a battle for truth and thus the phrase "blinded the minds" but it's not just a battle for truth. Satan knows the truth about God much better than any one of us knows. But Satan hates God. He hates the idea of God reigning over him. He knows he believes the truth, but that's not enough for us. As James says, "You believe that God is one. You do well." Even the demons believe and shudder. So it's not just a battle for the minds, it's a battle for the heart. We need God to speak to our hearts, to quicken them, to energize them, to regenerate them, cleanse them, illuminate them. This is why Jesus' kingdom is not an outside in kingdom. Every other kingdom is like that. Every other religion is like that. Here's the path. Here's the externalities that you do in order to be part of the religion of the kingdom, et cetera. No, Jesus' kingdom's inside out. He comes, he regenerates our hearts, he illuminates our minds and now we belong to Him. We are now his. Our life is now his double fold. It's his because he created us and it's his because he recreated us in ransom dust with his blood. Let's look at the text today. Today it's Mark 1:16-39. "Passing alongside the sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew, the brother of Simon, casting a net into the sea for they were fishermen." And Jesus said to them, "Follow me and I'll make you become fishers of men." And immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on a little farther, he saw James, the son of Zebedee and John, his brother who were in boat in their boat mending the nets. And immediately he called them and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him. And they went into Capernaum. And immediately on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and was teaching and they were astonished at his teaching for he taught them as one who had authority and not as the scribes. And immediately there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit. And he cried out, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the holy one of God." But Jesus rebuked him saying, "Be silent and come out of him." And the unclean spirit convulsing him and crying out with a loud voice came out of him, and they were all amazed so that they questioned among themselves saying, "What is this, a new teaching with authority?" He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him. At once his fame spread everywhere throughout all the surrounding region of Galilee. Immediately, he left the synagogue and entered the house of Simon and Andrew and James and John with James and John. Now Simon's mother-in-law lay ill with a fever, and immediately they told him about her and he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up and the fever left her and she began to serve them. That evening at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or oppressed by demons and the whole city was gathered together at the door and he healed many who were sick with various diseases and cast out many demons, and he would not permit the demons to speak because they knew him. And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place. There he prayed and Simon and those who were with him searched for him and they found him and said to him, "Everyone is looking for you." And he said to them, "Let us go on to the next towns that I may preach there also. For that is why I came out." And he went throughout all Galilee preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons. This is the reading of God's holy, infallible, authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time. First, King Jesus commands, "Follow me." Second King Jesus exercises lies and demons. And third King Jesus came to preach truth and grace. First King Jesus commands, "Follow me." In verse 16, it starts with the word passing. He's passing alongside, but it's not just a word of him walking by. It's an allusion to the Old Testament and the Old Testament, Elijah passes by Elijah before commissioning him. In the preceding passage, God, before he commissions Elijah, he passes by. And if you recall the theophany to Moses, this is when God appeared to Moses. It was the same idea that God passed by in order to share his presence and then also to commission. As he passes by, he saw these two young men. The verb for saw is a possessive gaze. That means Jesus Christ sees them and he sees that they are his, and what's fascinating is he doesn't see the externalities. He doesn't judge his people, judge people by the outside. God judges by what's in the heart. He doesn't see their entrepreneurial spirit. He doesn't see their hardworking ethic. It's not those things that drew him to them. No, it was his choice. It was his initiative. And salvation is always the initiative of God first. He pursues, he comes to us, he seeks us out. He subdues our hearts. He calls us to himself. If you remember John 15, Jesus said, "You did not choose me. I chose you. Why? And I appointed that you should bear much fruit." And this is what he's telling these young men. He says, "Follow me and you'll become fishers of men. Follow me, and I have a vision for your life. I have a vision for the best version of you, the best version of your life." And the best version of your life is to follow Jesus as closely as possible. How do you get as close as possible to Jesus? You do what Jesus does. You go where Jesus goes. Jesus is saying, "I'm in the business of fishing for people, fishing for men." What he's saying, it's an allusion to the Old Testament. Anytime the phrase or the metaphor "fishing for people" is used, it's a metaphor for warfare. So Jesus comes as a king, as the commander in chief of the world, so to speak, and he's saying, "I'm the king. Come bend the knee to me. Begin to live under my lordship and reign and I'll be your perfect redeemer, and I will take you where I go and I will make you do what I do, which is saving people." A lot of people think that if I'm not a follower of Jesus Christ and I'm free from Christ, I'm free from God, I'm free from the commandments. And that's the lie of the evil one. That was the lie from the very beginning. Satan told Adam and Eve, "Don't listen to God. You don't have to obey him. Have freedom. You'll be like gods if you obey me. But if you stop obeying God immediately, you are in submission to the enemy." Those are the only choices and therefore you're caught in lies and you're caught in sins and you are not free. And Jesus here, he says, "I'll make you fishers of men." It's warfare language. I am recruiting you as soldiers. So when he says, "Follow me," he's drafting them into the holy army for hearts and souls. What's fascinating is that the word follow me, this is a command. He shows up to them, he says, "This is what you're doing." They drop their nets, they follow him. You mustn't forget that when God speaks, he speaks with authority because he is God. Every evening, we have devotions with our daughters. We have four daughters, and recently we've been going through this little book of devotions where they make the Bible digestible. Sometimes a little too digestible. So I'm reading a story about Jericho where the people of God were told by God to walk around the city for six days and it doesn't make sense to them, but they do what God says. On the seventh day, the walls crumble, et cetera. And the punchline for the story was sometimes when God asks you to do something, it doesn't make sense on the front end, but then after you do what he asks you to do, then you see the point. And I was like, "What?" As I read it, I'm like, "Whoa, hold on, hold on. God never asks us to do anything." When God speaks, he speaks with authority and he commands and that's what we see here. This isn't an invitation. This is a draft notice. You are mine and you are going to do what I said. And obviously that's the best thing for us. We see the brothers are named Simon and Andrew. Simon is the first one. Simon is Simon Peter. Later on in this book, Jesus changes his name in chapter three. He said, "You were given the name. Your birth name is Simon, but since you followed me, now you are mine. I'm going to give you a new identity. I'm going to give you a new vision and a purpose for life and a new name, the name of Peter, which means rock." And he's called Peter the rest of the gospel from chapter three on until chapter four. In chapter four, he reverts back to his old ways in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus said, "Peter, I need you to stay up. I need you to pray for me. I'm about to enter the biggest battle of my life, of my existence." This was on the cross as he battles Satan's sin and death and absorbs the wrath of God. And Peter fell asleep. So Jesus comes to him, says, "Simon, Simon, could you not even stay awake for an hour?" And it shows us that there is a tendency even after we come to Jesus Christ, even after we have been redeemed to revert back to our old ways, Peter is given the pride of place here in this list. In this chapter, four men are called. Peter is first and he's also always first in the list of the 12. He was the first disciple chosen by Jesus, and therefore he was the first disciple to whom the resurrected Christ appeared. We see this in 1 Corinthians 15. Now, I would remind you, brothers of the gospel, I preach to you which you received and which you stand by which you are being saved. If you hold fast to the word I preach to you, unless you believed in vain, for I delivered to you as of first importance, what I also received, that Christ died for our sins. And according with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures and that he appeared to Cephas. That's Peter. Then to the 12. Then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive though some have fallen asleep. And Jesus tells them, "Follow me." In rabbinic literature, the pupil or the disciple goes after the rabbi, but the Rabbi never says, "Follow me." The Rabbi would always say, "Follow my teachings, follow the teachings or the school of thought that I prescribe to." Jesus doesn't say that. Jesus says, "Follow me." Not just my teaching, but my teaching lived out. And this is important because a lot of people when they come to faith, they start studying scripture, start studying theology, and they're so engrossed by it and you should be because it's fascinating. It's mind boggling. It's mind blowing. It's incredible. Study the scriptures, but also understand that the God that wrote the scriptures is also the God who's always with us. When you close the book, you're still called to follow Jesus Christ. And this is what Jesus told the disciples. He said, "It's better that I leave. It's better for you that I leave because when I'm here, I am physically in your presence. But when I'm physically not in your presence, I'm not in your presence. It's better that I leave because when I leave, I will send the Holy Spirit." And the Holy Spirit allows us to always be in the presence of God, to always walk with God, to always speak with God. When we're reading the scriptures, you have access to the author of the scriptures as you believe and obey. So immediately they left their nets and they followed him. And we see the power of Jesus' word, "Follow me." And all of a sudden, all of the human reticence and reluctance has been washed away instantly as God has arrived on the scene. He speaks, they obey, they get in line, they follow him. It's commanded. Delayed obedience is disobedience. I know when God is moving in our church, and I know he's moving in this season in particular way because people come to me, people I've never met, and they say, "Look, I've never met you, but for some reason something is compelling me to come here. I don't know what it is. I have no Christian background, but I'm being drawn." I say, "I know exactly what that is. That's God drawing you and wooing you in. That's the authority of his Holy Spirit saying that you belong to him." He continues in Mark 1:19 going on a little farther. He saw James, the son of Zebedee and John, his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. Again, he saw. That's the seizure with his gaze. He sees because they are his. Zebedee here is mentioned to distinguish James and John from the other James and John in scripture. James the Lord's brother and John the Baptist. Peter with these two form the inner circle of Jesus Christ, and later they become the three pillars of the Jerusalem church. They were in the boat mending their nets. They're working. This was a small business and they had hired servants. In verse 20, it says, "Immediately he called them and they left their father Zebedee in the boat and the hired servants and followed him." So they're living a nice middle class life. They have some employees and a business. They're doing fine. Then Jesus shows up and messes up their plans for their own life. And what we see is instantaneous obedience. He speaks. There's urgency. They immediately leave everything. There's an escalation from Simon and Andrew's calling because James and John don't just abandon their property as Peter and Andrew do, but they do leave their father behind. This shows us that Christ the king deserves commands, expects our uncompromising dedication. And no, we're not all called to be vocational Christians where we do this for full-time job, but we are all called to be full-time Christians, full-time followers of Jesus Christ. The point here is that nothing must stand in the way of our wholehearted devotion to Christ. Not finances, not family, not partnerships, not even parents. So Jesus Christ takes precedence. His authority is greater than even our parents. He must be first of everything in life. Mark 8:34, Christ says this explicitly in calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it. For what is a prophet, a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul, for what can a man give in return for his soul?" So friend, today, are you following Jesus Christ? This is what it means to be a Christian. Are you following Jesus Christ wholeheartedly with wholehearted devotion? Or is there something in the way? Or is there something pulling you back from following him? Is he commanding you some specific mission that you just keep putting off, keep putting off? When Jesus commands, we are to say, "Yes, sir." So here we see the first batch of recruits and they're given a taste of battle as Jesus Christ goes to battle. In the previous sermon, we saw Jesus went into the wilderness to fight Satan. Satan tempted Christ. Jesus did battle with Satan against his temptations with the word of God as he memorized Deuteronomy. Every response was from the Book of Deuteronomy. And here we see Jesus go into the battle of a synagogue. He goes into a synagogue where the people of God met on a weekly basis and he begins to preach the word of God. And you say, "What was the substance of his teaching?" I think the substance of his teaching, wherever he went into the synagogues, the Sermon on the Mount. If you read the Sermon on the Mount, what Jesus is doing there is he's saying, "I'm establishing a brand new kingdom." But it's not different than the kingdom of the Old Testament. The kingdom of the Old Testament, God gives the 10 Commandments. These are the moral laws by which we are to live in the kingdom of God and establish the kingdom of God. And then Jesus said, "I didn't come to abolish law but to fulfill it." And then every single one of the commandments he goes through and he says, "You have heard it was said. But I say unto you, you have heard that it was said. The externals are enough." And Jesus said, "No, they're not enough. You have to obey out of heartful of love toward God, and you have to obey from the heart." So here Jesus goes into a synagogue. This is 0.2. King Jesus exercises lies and demons and we see the opening battle. He and the four disciples walk into the synagogue, verse 21, and they went to Capernaum. And immediately on the Sabbath, he entered the synagogue and was teaching. A Capernaum small village at the north end of the Sea of Galilee. Even today there's a magnificent restored synagogue there on that site from about the fourth or fifth century. They say it's built on the remains of the first century synagogue, presumably the one from the story. He goes there on the Sabbath, on the Lord's day, he'sfulfilling the commandments by worshiping God on the Sabbath. It was aSaturday. We gather as the people of God on a Sunday because Christ rose fromthe dead on a Sunday.and he goes into a synagogue. Whenever I come across Jesusin the synagogue, I'm like, "We are very biblical." We are sobiblical as we are in a synagogue on the Lord's day. What the word synagoguejust means, it's a place of gathering for the saints of God, of Jewish peoplewho gathered for worship, scriptural study. The word for church, ecclesia, hasthe same idea. It's the gathering of the saints of those who are called out byGod. And the Lord tells us, "Do not forsake the gathering of thesaints." And this is why we gather. What does he do? He teaches. What does he do? He probably teaches from the word of God and he teaches the word in a way that the people have never heard. This is verse 22, and they were astonished at his teaching for he taught them as one who had authority and not as the scribes. So Jesus as the word of God, as the Son of God, opens up the word of God and he teaches with the authority of God. He doesn't just say, "Some people said this about the ..." This is the word of the Lord, thus sayeth the Lord and the divine king is preaching and applying the word. It's fascinating that people have never heard sermons like this. They gather in the synagogue as the people of God and the scribes would get up. There's a difference in the content and the authority. And you say, "What were the scribes doing?" What the scribes were doing was they were teaching what the other scribes before them taught them. What happened through the years was people stopped preaching the word of God because the word of God is inherently offensive to sinners. It's inherently offensive to those who rebel against God. So they started placating the word, making it more palatable, softening it a little bit. What happened was they started teaching manmade rules instead of the law of God. And Jesus calls them out on this. He says, by quoting Isaiah, "These people, they honor me with their hearts, with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." They teach manmade rules as commands of God, therefore skillfully sidestepping the commandments. Jesus came in and he says, "Look, the commandments are still enforced, the 10 Commandments, and we've broken them." Every single one of us, we've broken the commandments. You can go through the 10 commandments. I'll just focus on the last one. The last one says, "Thou shall not envy. Thou should not envy anything that your neighbor has." We have all broken that commandment, especially in the day and age that we live. If you have social media, you've definitely broken that commandment. If you've driven around the house and seen some of the houses in Brookline, you've definitely broken that commandment. Inside our hearts, we've broken the 10th commandment and the word of God says that the penalty for breaking any commandment is death. Jesus comes in and he preaches the commandments and he says, "You have not kept them from the heart." So what do we need? We need someone to die instead of us, die in our place. And St. Paul talks about the law of God as a school master. It's supposed to teach us our need for grace. It's supposed to drive us to God, drive us to the cross and say, "Lord, I need grace." And this is what Jesus taught. In Mark 1:23 as soon as he's teaching the word, all of a sudden we see the Satan's not happy. Immediately, there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit and he cried out. So immediately as Jesus starts proclaiming the word of God, the demon makes his appearance and he does the same thing that Satan loves to do. Jesus tells a parable, "The sower is like the preacher. The sower goes and sows the seed of God's word. There are four different soils. One of the soils, the word lands on top because of the hardness of the heart and doesn't penetrate." And then Jesus says, "Then Satan comes swooping and steals the word and the word doesn't bear any fruit." And that's what this demon is doing. It says it's an unclean spirit. It's the opposite of the Holy Spirit and the man is with an unclean spirit. It was in him. The literal interpretation was the man's personality has been usurped by the demon. The demon has swallowed up the person. This is how Satan works. If you do not belong to God, you leave yourself open to being influenced and possessed by Satan. Satan as he enters you, demons as they enter you, they want to make the absolute worst version of you. They want to oppress the personality of the person where ultimately it's just the demon. And demons do the opposite of what the Holy Spirit does. When you repent of sin and you turn to Christ, you enter the kingdom of God. You're filled with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit wants you to become the best version of yourself, the most powerful version of yourself. He says, "Follow me and I will make you become fishers of men." That's the best version of you. In verse 24, the demon speaks, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the holy one of God." The demon understands there's a conscious difference. There's a difference of consciousness between them and Jesus. What are they doing? What's the demon doing here? He's invoking the name of Christ. He says, "Jesus of Nazareth." In ancient magical text, the magician would invoke the name of the God or the demon and say, "I know you." So the demon here is battling Jesus. And he's saying, "I know you, therefore I have authority over you." But he understands that authority is non-existent because Jesus has come to destroy them. He says, "Have you come to destroy us?" And the demon here is speaking the first person plural on behalf of all the demons. Zechariah 13 gives us a passage that is associated with exorcism when the Messiah comes, when the King of Israel comes, Zechariah 13:1. "On that day, there will be a fountain open for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness. And on that day declares the Lord of hosts. I will cut off the names of the idols from the land so that they shall be remembered no more. And also, I will remove from the land, the prophets and the spirit of uncleanness." He says, "I know who you are. You're the holy one of God. You're the one that's sent by God to silence the demons and to cast them out, to cleanse the land of the demons." In Mark 1:25, Jesus rebukes him saying, "Be silent and come out of him." By be silent, one translator says, "Be muzzled." Another says, "Shut your trap." It is rude language and he is rude to the demons because the demons have ruined absolutely everything. So we see Jesus' authority. He stands over the demons. Yes, they have a power, but his power is greater. In verse 26, "And the unclean spirit convulsing him and crying out with a loud voice came out of him." Convulsing him, the verb literally means to tear and rend. It's used especially of the action of dogs or carnivorous animals. And this is his last gasp. This is his last attempt to destroy his host. The demon submits, but he doesn't do it quietly, he does leave and he does depart. And Jesus miraculously saves this person from demonic influence. Are the demons alive today? Yes, they are. Are they operating today? Yes, they are. And we live in a day and age where they're becoming more and more explicit about it in music and Hollywood, et cetera. And there is a power. There is a power in the demonic. There is a power in the satanic. Satan does offer people things. "Follow me and I will give you..." This is the same temptation that he attempted Jesus with. "Submit to me, worship me and I will give you reign and rule over these cities." And this is happening and people are vocal about it. There's videos. I was watching a video of Bob Dylan when he was talking about when he was young, and he said, "I made a deal with Satan and he's the commander in chief of the world." And he said, "As soon as I did that, I would sit down and beautiful lyrics just started pouring out, but I can't do it anymore." It's true. People give room to Satan. Satan does possess. Satan does operate. And therefore, this is one of the commands of God is to repent of sin and turn to Christ. Leave that kingdom, leave Satan's power, accept a greater power. As soon as you repent and believe, God gives you the power of the Holy Spirit. Satan can no longer possess you, and God continues to use you and he continues to sanctify us. But demons do oppress. Even believers, they do attack, they do attempt to bring affliction. And we live in the city where demons are at work. Whenever I leave the city and I come back, I feel the oppression. I've even gotten to the point where I don't even want to leave the city because I don't even want to know that there's more tranquil places in the world. I just want to stay here, I'm rooted here, and battle Satan with prayers and the word of God. But we must know that the one who is in us is stronger than the one in the world. So if you are oppressed by a demonic, if demons do tempt, et cetera, et cetera, rebuke them. Rebuke them in the name of Jesus Christ. Say it out loud. "I rebuke you in the name of Jesus Christ, by the blood of Jesus Christ. I rebuke you." And they flee at his name. Mark 1:27, they were all amazed so that they questioned among themselves saying, "What is this, a new teaching with authority. He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him." And there is an ironic contrast in this text. They understand his authority. They understand that teaching is different. They understand that he rebukes even demons. And how many of them say, "Can I follow you? We want to follow you. We want to submit to you." No, it's just Jesus and the four disciples. So what's ironic here is the demons know the identity of Jesus better than these people. The demons obey Jesus, and these people do not. The question before us is, do we obey? Do we obey the king of kings? When he speaks, when his word is absolutely clear, when his will is absolutely clear, do we obey Jesus Christ? Matthew 25:41, "Then he will say to those on his left, depart from me, you cursed into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." Hell was prepared for Satan and demons, and Jesus came to save people from this place of torture, of eternal damnation. We do it by repenting of sin, turning to him and entering his kingdom. In verse 28, once his fame spread everywhere throughout all the surrounding region of Galilee, his fame spreads and people are beginning to realize the Messiah is here. The question is, will they obey? Point three is King Jesus came to preach truth and grace. Verse 29, "And immediately he left the synagogue and entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John. Now Simon's mother-in-law lay ill with a fever, and immediately they told him about her." A few yards away from the site in Capernaum where they built a synagogue in the fifth century, there was a group of small one room houses over one of which is built an octagonal church in the fifth century, presumably because they thought that this was the place where Peter lived and it was the base camp for Jesus Christ and his ministry. I do want to point out that Peter had a house, and when Jesus Christ called Peter and said, "Follow me," one of the things that Jesus is doing is he's saying, "I have your heart. I have your time. I have your life." And everything that belongs to you now belongs to me. Jesus Christ here commandeers the house of Peter and Andrew. Later on, he commandeers their boat and he preaches off their boat. This is how King Jesus works. When your sins are forgiven, you enter the kingdom of God, you and everything you have, your heart, your soul, your mind, your strength, all of your talents, all of your opportunities, all the stuff you have is now in service to King Jesus. And here I do also want to point out that Peter was married. Simon's mother-in-law lay ill. He had a wife. So 1 Corinthians 9:5, Paul comments on this, "Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife as do the other apostles?" And the brothers of the Lord and Cephas. I say that because Peter is considered the first Pope. A Catholic church considers Peter as the first pope and the first pope was married. This is important. That should have set the example for the rest of the church. So many implications there. Mark 1:31. "And he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up and the fever left her and she began to serve him." I love the tenderness of Christ's compassion. He sees Peter's mother-in-law sick. He takes her by the hand and he heals her, which is an incredible image of God. This is how God tenderly ministers to us in particular moments of darkness or pain or suffering. Isaiah 41:13, "For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand. It is I who say to you, fear not. I am the one who helps you." And he lifts her up. The word for lift her up is he raised her. It's the same verb that's used in his resurrection of the dead girl. And the fever leaves her immediately. As soon as she gets up, this is fascinating, she begins to serve them. They had just been in synagogue all morning and doing battle against lies and against demons. Something about the Sabbath when you come home, that lunch after Sabbath, you know what I'm saying? It's more delicious than any other lunch. And then the nap that comes after. It's just a glorious blessed sleep. That's what they were expecting, but she was sick. So Jesus heals her. And then it says she started to serve them. And this is the pattern of salvation. When Jesus saves us, the next response should be, "Jesus, what am I to do? How am I to serve you? How am I to serve your people?" Verse 32, "That evening at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or oppressed by demons." So Peter's house is now the center of Jesus' ministry, and these people waited until the Sabbath ended. Because of their religious understanding of the Sabbath, you can't do any work and they assume that you can't even do good. And Jesus said in Mark 3:4, he said, "Is it lawful in the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?" But they were silent. So on the Sabbath, we are to worship God. It's a day devoted to the Lord, and we are to do good to people. So these people wait until the end of the Sabbath, start bringing these people to Jesus in verse 33. The whole city was gathered together at the door, and he healed many who were sick with various diseases and cast out many demons. And he would not permit the demons to speak because they knew him. Jesus puts a divine gagging order on the demons. He doesn't want them to preach the gospel. He doesn't want them to preach his identity. He wants the disciples to do that. And then he wants to protect himself from the charge that he is colluding with Satan, which was a charge that the scribes and the Pharisees brought against Jesus. And Jesus said, "If a kingdom rises against itself, it shall not stand. I come to you casting out demons with the finger of God." Verse 35, "After a very busy day of ministry, after preaching and teaching and casting out demons, you expect Jesus to take a couple days, rest up." No. Instead, he steals hours from his sleep in order to spend time with God. Verse 35, "And rising very early in the morning while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place where he prayed." Why did Jesus do this? Why did Jesus take time to pray? He had no sins to repent of. He didn't need human possessions. Why does he spend time with the Father? He wants the Father's presence, and he understands that after serving people and after casting out demons, he needs power. He spends time in the presence of God, and by spending time in the presence of God, he is powering up. That's what prayer is. Prayer is powering up. This is how we recharge our battery. Satan attacks me usually on Saturdays because he wants to throw me off from preaching the word of God. And yesterday, I drive to the gym, I go to the gym, I do the workout. I'm exhausted. I'm just drenched with sweat. And I get in my car, and this is supposed to be the moment where I'm like, "All right, I can relax. I can drive home." It doesn't start. There's no lights. Nothing's working. I'm like, "Oh man, I've never had issues with my battery." And there's a guy that pulls up on one of those minis and I'm like, "It's okay. It'll do it." And I've got the jumper cables, I hooked up the mini and the whole time I'm like, "Lord, what are you trying to do? You want me to fish for this guy? I'll fish for this guy." And then he's like, "What do you do?" And I tell him what I do. So we had that conversation. His car wasn't strong enough. Then I had to go into the gym. There was another gentleman that let me jumpstart from his car. Wouldn't work. And then finally bring in Coach John from the gym. Coach John, big guy. He drives a white Highlander. Pull up the Highlander 2020. I'm like, "This'll do it great." Nothing. Nothing's working. And then I realized I probably need a new battery. Call up my wife. She comes. I tried to jump from the car. It doesn't work. We go to Auto Zone, get the new battery, come back to the truck. So much work. I'm not mechanically inclined. I know how to use YouTube University. So I'm on YouTube because the guy at AutoZone, he told me, he's like, "You need professional help." And I was like, "I know." He's like, "I mean professional mechanic." And I was like, "I know." And then he let me borrow his tools. I take the stuff apart. It's such a pain. I put the new battery in and my wife's like, "Don't put the bar on top. There's a bar that covered the battery." She's like, "Don't do it because it probably won't work." And I was like, "Get away from me with this lack of faith. Stop it." And she's like, "It's just the way the Lord always works with you. He makes you suffer." So then I get into the truck, I get into the truck, and it's not starting nothing. Nothing. At that point, I just started praying. I got nothing else. In Jesus' name, I'm casting out demons from my vehicle. Lord Jesus, please, please. And I said, "Amen." I pressed the button and it starts. So it was a little miracle. Praise the Lord. But it's all to say, it doesn't matter how powerful your engine, it's a V8. It doesn't matter how powerful, robust the frame, the tire. If the battery is dead, nothing works. And this is why prayer is so important. Prayer is how we recharge. In the presence of the Lord, you power up and you say, "Lord, what would you have for me to do?" And we live in a day and age where a lot of people are more concerned with the battery on their phone, how much the phone's charged than you're worried about the battery of your soul. And here Jesus gives us not just an example, but it is a charge that we are to make time to spend with the Lord, to power up in order to continue to serve him effectively. So as he's praying, Simon says, verse 36, "And Simon and those who are with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, everyone is looking for you." And you say, "Well, that's good. Everyone's searching for him." But the word for search here is always used in the hostile sense as if they were hunting for him, desperate in their search. Why this word to describe their search? Because they wanted what God could do for them. They wanted what Jesus could do for them. They wanted to use Jesus. They view Jesus as a king with external authority that's going to help me in the externalities of life. They weren't looking for a king to rule their hearts, their minds, their souls. They wanted a king to submit to them rather than submitting to the king and his agenda. They were seeking to control Jesus rather than following and obeying him. I saw this... It was like a cartoon of a guy who's in prison and he's behind bars and he's reaching for outside the bars. There were two things. There were keys. It's like you can get out. And there was a loaf of bread, and his hand went to the loaf of bread. This is what these people are doing. They're like, "Jesus, we want you to fix our short-term problem." Instead of saying, "Jesus, please release us from the captivity of Satan and sin." So what does Jesus do? He sees they're not looking for God. They're not looking for transformation. They're not looking to enter his kingdom. He says in verse 38, he said to them, "Let us go on to the next towns that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out." And he went throughout all Galilee preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons. The phrase for why I came out is an important phrase. It's used elsewhere to come out for battle. When Jesus was being arrested by the scribes, the Pharisees, the Roman soldiers, Mark 14:48, he uses the same phrase. And Jesus said to them, "Have you come out, as against a robber with swords and clubs to capture me? Day after day I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize me." But let the scriptures be fulfilled and they all left him and fled. And Jesus says, "We could do miracles here." A short-term fix. Jesus didn't come just to heal the body primarily. He came to heal the soul. He came to regenerate heart. So he says, "Let us go on. This is why I came out, to battle Satan, sin and death." And he does that with his word. And then he says, "Let us go." He's including his disciples in that church. "Let us go. Let us preach the word. This is how we do battle against Satan, against the lies of the evil one. This is how the kingdom of God is built." In conclusion, there are ultimately only two kingdoms, the kingdom of Jesus Christ and the kingdom of Satan. And you today are currently in one or the other. You belong either to Jesus or to Satan. You are possessed either by Jesus or you are a possession of Satan and he can possess you at any time. King Jesus came to save you from Satan's dominion. And he did that by living a life of perfect submission to God, the Father, thereby fulfilling all the commandments from the heart. And then Jesus allows Satan to take his best shot at destroying the holy one of God. And Satan did his best, but he failed, praise be to God. And Jesus rose from the dead victoriously, proving once and for all who the real king is. The king today says, "Receive the good news. Repent, believe, submit, obey. Follow the king, and he will make you fishers of men." Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for your incredible word. We thank you, Lord, that you have a power and authority that is greater than even Satan, than even the demonic. And Lord, you entrust us with that authority, and you tell us to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that you taught us. And Lord, let us start with ourselves. Let us be a people who obey everything that you taught us, empowered by grace. Because we have been saved, we want to and we long to serve you. Praise your name, glorify your name. And Lord, do make us fishers of men. Make us people that follow you and recognize that we experience you more closely when we do what you called us to do, which is to tell people about the good news, to tell people that they have broken commandments, that they are in the nets of Satan and sin. And to call them to repent and believe and submit to the king. Continue to build up your church, continue to build up your kingdom. And Lord, we thank you that we get to be used by you in the process. We pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Tremendous News: The King Loves You

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 10, 2023 47:34


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you for giving us your holy word, and we thank you for sending us your holy Son. We thank you that your son came as a savior to save us from our sins, but you also came as Lord. And Jesus, we thank you that you went to the cross and you paid the penalty for our law-breaking, our transgressions of the law. And Jesus, you bled. The holy Son of God, you bled on that cross in order to cleanse us, in order to save us, and then also to give us grace. And you came back from the dead as the conquering king and you gave us marching orders to go and make disciples of all nations and to take dominion of this world, to take it back from the usurper, back from Satan, back from the enemy. And I pray, Lord, that you empower us by the Holy Spirit. Baptize us with the Holy Spirit. Send each one of us a special anointing to proclaim your word everywhere we go. To know your word, study your word, meditate upon your word, and to testify to the greatness of our God. Lord Jesus, show us what it means that you are our king. And that when you tell us to follow you, that is a command. Those are marching orders. And wherever in our lives we are not following you, I pray, give us grace. Transform our wills, transform our minds, transform our hearts. Lord Jesus, we pray that you bless the sermon series. We pray that you anoint it and I pray that your holy church will be built up. And I pray those who are far from you will be redeemed and regenerated and transformed from being rebels to being your children. And I pray, Lord, in this season that you send us the gift of evangelism, a passion for evangelists to proclaim the gospel of the king. The king is here. We deserve His wrath, but He came to extend mercy and grace and call us to follow him. I pray that you bless our time in the holy scriptures. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. So we're beginning a sermon series through the Gospel of Mark that we are calling Kingdom Come, the Gospel of Mark and the secret of God's kingdom. And Jesus Christ, when He came, His very first words were the kingdom of God is at hand. So He's established the kingdom, the king is here, and then the Lord Jesus Christ teaches us to pray. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And that prayer is not just a prayer, that's our purpose. Yes, we cry out, Lord, may your kingdom come. But what we're saying is, Lord, give me the power to establish your kingdom. The title of the sermon today is Tremendous News: The King Loves You. And it's tremendous news because we don't deserve that love. It's a shock that He comes as a loving savior. Why? Because we deserve the wrath of God for our law-breaking. And just to give you perspective on this, I take an example from history from Fyodor Dostoevsky. Before he wrote Crime and Punishment, before he wrote The Idiot, before he wrote The Brothers Karamazov, he was actually sentenced to death by a firing squad by Tsar Nicholas I. For what? Listening to stories, criticizing the armed forces, owning an illegal printing press in order to create anti-government propaganda, and contributing to plot against the Tsar. So he was part of a group of rebels. There were 21 members in the circle and Dostoevski is 27 at that time. And they were brought into a public square and they were forced to kneel, kiss a cross, and then undergo a symbolic beheading where swords were broken above their heads. They were tied to pillars in the town square, blindfolded and then they started awaiting their execution. But immediately before they were shot, an envoy from the Tsar arrived with the stay of execution saying, don't shoot. And the men were pardoned by the king from execution and forced to serve in hard labor and a labor camp for four years. And you say, how would that change a man knowing he's about to be executed and all of a sudden there is a stay of execution? Dostoevsky, after the averted execution said, "Today I faced death for three quarters of an hour. I was a hair's breadth away from death, and now I am living again." He wrote his brother after the event, "I'm being reborn in another form." In the same way that the brightest dawn follows the darkest night, the best and the greatest, the most tremendous news always comes right after the deepest realization of the most terrible news. Well, what is the terrible news? That you and I, we have broken the law of God, the holy law of the holy God. This is the ultimate act of insurrection. And God created you with eternal soul. He breathed his spirit into you. We have eternal souls created by an eternal God. So what's the punishment for insurrection against the holy God of the universe? It's banishment from God's kingdom. That's what we deserve. Exile. And how long is that exile? Eternal because God is eternal and so are our souls. We deserve execution. We deserve eternal damnation for rebelling against the holy God. So when the king of kings comes, it's surprising that He doesn't come with execution and eviction notices. When the king comes, the king comes with pardon and amnesty and forgiveness and mercy, but also grace. This is what the gospel is all about, that God is offering to us today, mercy. Mercy is you don't get what you deserve, but He also gives us grace. And grace is we get what we don't deserve. God has mercy on rebels and He gives us grace in adopting us as sons and daughters because of the sacrifice of king Jesus on the cross. Jesus came as a Jewish man, but He's not just the king of the Jews or just the king of Israel. He's the king of everyone and the king of everything. And there's only two kinds of people, children of God or rebels. Soldiers of King Jesus or soldiers of king Satan. And if you turn from your sin and you submit to the king, if you believe in His gospel, something incredible happens. The miracle of the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you are regenerated from within. God gives you a brand new heart with brand new desires and your mind is renewed by the power of God. And God now can look at you as He looks at His son Jesus Christ and say, this is my child in whom I'm well pleased. And grace also is a power source. God gives us grace as energy to become kingdom builders. Jesus Christ said, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and everything else shall be added onto you." St. Paul said, "I am what I am by the grace of God, but the grace of God was not in vain in me. It wasn't given to me in vain. Instead," he says, "I worked harder than the rest of them. "And he's talking about the other apostles. So God gives us grace to do what? To follow Him, build His kingdom. And it all starts with the tremendous news that He's willing to forgive us if we repent. And this news does change us, it rivets us and it changes your whole perspective on reality. Would you please look at the text with me today? We're in Mark 1:1-15, "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. Behold, I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight." John appeared baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now, John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey. And he preached saying, 'After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie. I've baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.' In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens being torn open and the spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, 'You are my beloved son with you, I'm well pleased.' The spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness and he was in the wilderness 40 days being tempted by Satan and he was with the wild animals and the angels were ministering to him. Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying, 'The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel.'" This is the reading of God's holy and inert, infallible, authoritative word, may it write these truths upon our hearts. Four points to frame up our time. First, the king has come. Second, the king is anointed. Third, the king declares war. And fourth, the kingdom has come. First, the king has come. Mark 1:1, the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the son of God written by Mark, who was probably an associate of Peter and Peter at that time was serving in Rome when this gospel was written. So this gospel is written to city dwellers and it's written in such a way where busy people can understand the gospel, understand who is Jesus, understand His person and His work. We see that Mark emphasizes action over teaching, it's very vivid. One of his favorite words is the word immediately. And what he's doing, he's writing to busy people. He's trying to get to the point as quickly as possible. And if you're new to the city, what you recognize is after a while here you realize you know who's from Boston because they walk fast and they talk fast. Fast walkers, fast talkers. And that's kind how I preach. I talk really fast, people tell me they can't 2X me on our podcasts or et cetera, but I want to get to the point as quickly as possible. And the point is, Jesus Christ, He's the point of everything. And here we see the freshness of discovery of who Jesus is. That's what Mark is trying to do. Over 150 times, he uses the historic present tense, putting past events in the present tense. Why? To increase the vividness. That what Jesus did, He's continuing to do today in and through the church as empowered by the Holy Spirit. It begins with the word the beginning. That's the very first word, and it's alluding to Genesis 1:1, that in the beginning God created everything and God created man and it was all beautiful. It was all wonderful, but we rebelled against God and Satan usurped dominion from Adam and Jesus Christ has come as a new Adam, as a new creation, as a new beginning for human beings. His name is Jesus in the English. In the Greek, it's Yesus, and Yesus is a transliteration of the Jewish word, Joshua. So Jesus is named after Joshua. In the Hebrew, His name, what it means is savior or literally Yahweh is salvation. So even in the name, what we see is that God is saying what Moses couldn't do, Joshua did. Moses could not take the promised land, could not bring the people of God into the promised land. Joshua did that. What Moses couldn't do, Jesus is going to do. Moses gave the law, but he couldn't transform hearts to obey God willingly. God can force His kingdom upon us and one day He will come with a flaming sword and He will judge. But the first time Jesus Christ comes, He doesn't come with a sword of power or physical sword. He comes with the sword of the spirit, wielding the word of God so people are transformed from the inside out. Moses gave the law, Jesus gives grace, which leads to heartfelt obedience, which empowers us to fulfill the law out of love for God and neighbor. Jesus Christ, a lot of people think that's His last name. That's not His last name. It wasn't Mary and Joseph Christ. This is a title, a kristos. It's from the Hebrew marcia or an anointed one. He's anointed to do what? He's anointed to be a royal figure. He's anointed to be king. So Jesus Christ actually just means is king. Sometimes they drive by churches and they're named Christ is king. I'm like, that means king is king. It's Jesus is king. That's the point, that He's come in order to establish the kingdom of God. He's the son of God. Son begotten of the Father. The Son of God is God as much as the Father is God, but the Son submits to the father's will. So we see right in the center of the faith, the faith is patriarchal with the Father up top and hierarchal, the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. When Jesus took on flesh, He was male. Jesus was a man, a Jewish man who lived under the law. And Jesus is the Son of God and the son of man, that's His messianic title. And the Holy Spirit is not an it. It's not just a force. The Holy Spirit is a person, the Holy Spirit is a he. And just for clarity's purposes, God's pronouns are He/Him. And I say that because confusion has come from theological schools. I remember taking classes at BU School of Theology and I realized that's not going to go well because the very first prayer I heard was a prayer to mother God. Well, that is not true. God is father. The gospel, the word gospel means good news or literally an announcement of something good associated with a military victory. It's good news of victory from the battlefield. And the nuance of military victory is extremely important for Mark who presents Jesus' ministry as triumph over Satan, over the demonic forces and over their human agents. In Isaiah, the announcer of good news or the one that brings the good news proclaims the victory of Yahweh Israel's true king over hostile forces. And this is just the beginning. It's the beginning of what Jesus taught and what He began to do and He continues to do today. In Mark 1:2, "As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, behold, I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." As it is written, it says. This is typical Jewish formula for citation of scripture. And the Greek, it's a perfect tense, has been written, implies past action with permanent results and suggesting that the ancient scriptures, it's not just a dead letter, but it's a living force in the present. As it has been written through the instrumentality of Isaiah, and then God speaks in the first person, meaning God inspired Isaiah by the spirit and he speaks to us through the word of God. And Mark affirms that what happened in Jesus followed the plan of salvation laid out by God and the prophecies of scriptures in the first 39 books of the Bible. Jesus came and His Bible were the Hebrew scriptures, the first three fourths of the Bible and this is why Mark quotes it in the very beginning. It was all promised. And He says, "I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way." So John the Baptist comes and John the Baptist is this voice and he's in the wilderness. And the word for wilderness or desert is érimos, is used three times in our texts today. And at the outset, all the action is in the wilderness. You say, why is that important? Because Adam was placed on the garden. The garden of Eden and everything was in bliss and everything was perfect. They walked in the presence of God, but he traded that garden for a wilderness by disobeying God. So the second Adam enters the wilderness to turn it back into a garden. Jesus is also the faithful son of God who unlike Israel, obeyed God completely. Israel disobeyed God. They were faithless and they walked in the wilderness for 40 years. But even there in the wilderness, God met them and He gave them the law and he cared for them and He provided for them. So in a sense, Jesus here is presented as the new Joshua, as the one who's going to lead the new exodus out of the wilderness to bring us into the presence of God. And what's the voice of one crying in the wilderness? What's he proclaiming? He's saying, "Prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight. Prepare. God is here, the Lord is here. Prepare the way of the Lord." So Jesus is called Lord right from the outset. Who is John? John comes as an Old Testament prophet in the spirit of Elijah. He was a cousin of Jesus so he knew Jesus, he knew his life. In many ways he was a wild man, but the Lord used that. And what was his message? His message is the king is here, the king is coming. Prepare. Prepare. And what's the assumption? Is that we're not ready, that we need to do something to become ready. The king is coming and we need to present ourselves as best we can for the king. And John's not calling for just a coat of paint. No, we've got structural issues. We need an overhaul, a full gut down to the studs. I remember I took a trip to Sochi, Russia in 2013. It was before the Olympics and I wanted to see what they're doing in preparation for the Olympics and I was doing some missions work. And then we're driving up into the mountains of Sochi and I just noticed that everything's beautiful, everything's tremendous. And then I realized I don't see any houses. There are no houses. All I see is a beautiful fence on both sides. And they realized that if we're going to bring people to the Olympics, we have to make everything presentable, but we don't have time to make the houses presentable or the villages presentable so we're just going to cover it all up with a beautiful veneer. Well, John's not calling us to do that. John is saying, "No, no, no. It's not a veneer, not a facade change, not just your behavior must change. No, no, no. We need a regeneration of the heart." And how does that happen? What does he say? He says, "Repent and be baptized." Mark 1:4. "John appeared baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." So John here, he comes baptizing, and this is the Greek word vaftízo, which means to dip, plunge, immerse, and can be used of dipping a cup in water, et cetera. So John is called the baptizing one. A lot of people think he's baptist, because John the Baptist, there were no Baptist denominations at that time. And by the way, if we're going to call him any denominations, he's definitely not Baptist. He'd get ex-communicated from most Baptist churches. No, he's probably more Pentecostal than anything, but he comes baptizing and you're like, why is he baptizing? What is baptism? Well, baptism at that time was something that the priest did. They washed themselves in ablutions before taking part in sacrifices. And then the latter practice was when Gentiles wanted to become part of the people of God, what was the practice? How did they purge themselves of uncleanness of their pagan life, so to speak? Well, they were immersed in a ritual bath and that became a requirement for their conversion. So what John here is doing is he's going to Jewish people and he's saying, "You have not lived as the children of God. You have not lived as the people of God. You have not lived a life of love and obedience to God and people in submission of God's holy law. You are not saved through genealogy." And so he's calling them to faith in their own God, faith in their own scriptures and says, if he's saying you have lived as Gentiles, you have lived as pagans now through baptism, you are becoming the children of God and it's all started with the heart first. There's a passage in Zechariah that's used extensively in the New Testament that shares several motifs from our text, water imagery and repentance and confession, forgiveness of sins and even reference to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And what this passage emphasizes is even repentance, even asking God for forgiveness, even asking God for mercy and grace, that's a gift in and of itself that it starts with the spirit of God working in our lives. So Zechariah 12:10, "And I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him as one mourns for an only child and weep bitterly for him as one weeps over a firstborn. On that day, the mourning in Jerusalem will be as great as the mourning for Hadad-rimmmon in the plain of Megiddo. The land shall mourn each family by itself, the family of the house of David by itself and their wives by themselves, the family of the house of Nathan by itself and their wives by themselves, the family of the house of Levi by himself and their wives by themselves, and the family of the Shimeites by itself and their wives by themselves and all the families that are left each by itself and their wives by themselves. On that day, there shall be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness." So John's baptism departed slightly from the baptism practice in the day. In the practice of the day, the Gentile convert would baptize themselves. They would go down to the water themselves. But here there's a second party, John is doing the baptizing, which is a symbol that we cannot save ourselves. We need someone from the outside and that's only Jesus Christ. And also John's baptism was only anticipatory of cleansing from sinfulness. It wasn't until the blood of Jesus Christ that we can truly be ransom from our sins. He comes proclaiming and the message is a message of repentance. What is the word repentance? It's literally a change of mind, a turning a direction of life, a returning. Like in the Old Testament, the prophets would come and they would say, repent. Repent. What they're saying is people of God, people of God turn back to God. Turn back to the word of God, implies a total change in spiritual orientation. And when repentance comes, we are forgiven of sins. It literally means ascending away or release, the release from guilt before God. Verse five, "And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem, were going out to him and we're being baptized by him in the river Jordan confessing their sins." And the phrase here for we're going out to him, it's a word that's applied in the Old Testament to the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt under Moses. And what Mark is doing is deliberately invoking Exodus Moses typology. Why? To show us that the new Moses has come, the new Joshua has come, the new exodus is here. In verse six, "Now John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey." I've always thought that he just did that because he's kind of a nut and this is the way that you attract a lot of attention to start a movement, but actually it's a picture of the primal back to earth reminiscent of the garden of Eden. Remember in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve they sinned and God promised that the day that you sin you will die. That day began their spiritual death, but God pardons them and there's a blood sacrifice. He takes two animals and there's bloodshed and he creates clothing out of skins of the animals. This picture here is as if John is standing outside of the Garden of Eden. It's as if he's standing in that presence of the angel with a flaming sword that blocked the entrance and he's saying this is the way that we get back into the Garden of Eden. This is the way we get back into the promised land, into the presence of God himself. Here the description presents John as an Elijah figure, Elijah in 1 Kings 18, if you remember this is the great battle between Yahweh and Baal. And in the same way Elijah was preaching the same message, 1 Kings 18:21, "Elijah came near to all the people and said, 'how long will you go limping between two different opinions?' If the Lord is God, follow him. But if Baal, then follow him. And the people did not answer him a word." John's clothing is similar to that of Elijah. Elijah preached a message of repentance and so does John. Elijah was associated with the wilderness, so is John and with the Jordan. And then also Elijah, when he was taken up to heaven before going he gave a double portion of his spirit to his disciple Elisha, doubling his power. So Jesus here similarly is presented as one greater than John, greater than even this great prophet of God and one that supersedes John. In verse seven, "And he preached saying after me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie". He's mightier than I am, mightier in every sense. He's stronger than I am, and also he's more honorable. He's saying, "I'm not even worthy of taking the leather strap that holds his sandal on his foot and unstrapping it." And in rabbinic sources, the untying of the master shoe is the task of the slave, not of the disciple. One rabbi even wrote a pupil does for his teacher all the tasks that a slave does for his master except untying his shoes. So for the rabbis, this is the lowest of the low. The disciples would not do this And John the Baptist, he's saying Jesus is so much more worthy than I am, so much greater in every sense than I am I'm not even worthy of doing the slave like service. And we got to stop here for a minute and we got to meditate on the implications of the meeting behind Jesus washing the feet of the disciples. If John isn't even worthy of doing this, for that's how great Jesus is. Jesus, why would you wash the disciples' feet? You're the king of the universe, why are you stooping down? Why did you take a basin of water? Why are you doing that? And John 13:12-17, "When he had washed their feet and put on His outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, 'Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me teacher and Lord and you are right for so I am. If I then your Lord and teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet for I have given you an example and you also should do just as I've done to you. Truly, truly I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.' If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them." What kind of king is this? This is the king that came to build a kingdom of hearts. This is a king that came to save us from our sins, to wash us from our uncleanness and stark in contrast to any other king. In Mark 1:8, "I've baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit." So Jesus is the anointed one, anointed with the Holy Spirit. That's what makes Him of the Messiah and the spirit endowed Messiah is the spirit endowing Messiah. And in the New Testament there's a linkage of spirit and water. 1 Corinthians 12:12, "For just as the body is one and has many members and all the members of the body, though many are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one spirit we were all baptized into one body. Jews and Greeks, slaves and free and all were made to drink of one spirit." Titus 3:4-7, "But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our savior appeared, he saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy. By the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life." Ezekiel 36, "This was promised, I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness and from all your idols I will cleanse you and I will give you a new heart. And a new spirit I will put within you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules." This is the promise of God that when we come to Him, when we repent of our sins and we beg Him for grace and mercy that He sends us the Holy Spirit. And I wonder, do you have the Holy Spirit? Have you been baptized with the Holy Spirit? Is the power of God, the indwelling power of God within you? And if you're not sure, look to the cross of Jesus Christ, ask for forgiveness of sins and say, Lord God, send me the spirit. Make me a person that is filled with the spirit of God to do the work that the Lord has for us. Second is the king is anointed and we see the baptism of Jesus in verse nine. "In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan and when He came up out of the water immediately he saw the heavens being torn open and the spirit descending on Him like a dove and a voice came from heaven. 'You are my beloved son. With you, I am well pleased.'" Here we see again the word immediately, it's Mark's favorite word. The word is used 51 times in the New Testament, and Mark uses it 41 times and what he's showing is that the spirit is at work and he can't be stopped. It says that the sky, the heavens were being torn open, being ripped apart. It's harsh words and not the one for opening of heavens in a visionary context, but it's literally the heavens tore open and all of a sudden we see the presence of God descending on Christ. Isaiah 64 cries out for this day, "Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at your presence as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil. To make your name known to your adversaries and that the nations might tremble in your presence." Mark uses this verb to tear apart twice in his gospel. Here he uses it and then he uses it that one time where Jesus is on the cross and He says it's finished, He's completed the work of redemption and then says that the veil in the temple was torn, ripped apart from top to bottom. What Mark is giving us is a glimpse into the very heart of reality, the meaning of life, the essence of the universe. According to scripture, it's the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit they are at the center of everything. And it's more as though invisible curtain right in front of us is pulled back and God reveals His person and His will. Christian life is like this, learning to differentiate between physical reality, which is not all there is and spiritual reality. And by God's grace we can walk by faith and not by sight. And we see the spirit descending upon Christ like a dove. It says why the dove? Well, the dove is an appropriate symbol for the spirit as it can cross the barrier between heaven and earth. And also, it's an echo of Genesis 1 where the spirit soars bird like fluttering over the waters. The trinity created the world. It was God and God's spirit and God's word, and here the Trinity is restoring the world. We see the Father speak, He is the voice, the son who is the word, and the spirit fluttering like a dove. And what does God say? God speaks and He says, "You are my beloved son." It's a near exact quotation of Psalm 2, which is a messianic psalm. Psalm 2:7 says, "I will tell of the decree the Lord said to me, you are my son, today I have begotten you." Psalm 2 was interpreted messianically in Judaism and in the Psalm the kingship of the anointed one is congruent with that of God. He says, you are my son. And then he includes the word beloved. And where have we heard this before? This is Genesis 22 where God says to Abraham, "The son, your beloved son whom you've been waiting for, I want you to bring him as a sacrifice to me." That's when God tested Abraham and obviously God stopped the sacrifice of Abraham, but that was typology. That was an example of what God the Father would not stop from doing. God the Father would bring down the sword of God's wrath upon his own son in order to redeem us. You're the beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. This is the good pleasure of God revealed, and the first time that was revealed was His delight in creation where He said is very good. So His life giving conviction that is very good that my son is baptized in the Holy Spirit and He's prepared to do battle against the evil one. At the center of the Godhead is a father delighting in His beloved son. And fathers, we are called to be godly and we are called to delight in our children. And children we're called to be godly and to be a delight to our fathers and mothers. And the whole Christian gospel can be summed up like this, when the living God looks at us at every believing and baptized Christian, He says to us what He says to Jesus here. The gospel promises us an imputation of the righteousness of God. The very second that you repent of your sins, your sin was transferred to Christ on the cross and His righteousness is transferred to you. So in a sense, the moment you're justified, God looks at you and says, no matter how you lived, no matter how many commandments you've broken, it says, you are my dear, dear child, I'm delighted with you. And then it begins the process of sanctification where we grow to become a greater delight to our father so that one day we can hear from God the Father. "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your father." The king is here, the king is anointed, the king is God's son. And what does the king do? Immediately after His anointing, He challenges the opposing king, which is Satan, and this point three, the king declares war. Verse 12, "The spirit immediately drove Him out into the wilderness and He was in the wilderness 40 days being tempted by Satan and He was with the wild animals and the angels were ministering to Him. The spirits that drove Him out, ekballei it's the same word that Mark uses to speak of exorcism. It's like a forceful ejection. On the one hand, the Holy Spirit is like a dove gently descending on Christ, but then the Holy Spirit sends Jesus immediately into battle against the enemy. It's the same spirit. And the king here goes on the offensive. Satan means adversary and he's the prince of the fallen angels, the supreme enemy both of God and man. When God created Adam and Eve, He told Adam, "Work and guard the garden, take dominion." And he didn't take dominion of Satan. They obeyed the lies of the evil one and Satan, usurped power, he took dominion of this world. And Jesus here immediately goes to fight the king of this world. And Matthew 4 gives us an explanation of what happened. Jesus in the fasted state for 40 days and Satan comes to Him and tempts Him, Jesus fought Satan with the word of God over and over and over. But what was the temptation? The temptation was Jesus, do not obey the will of the Father perfectly. Jesus join my team. Jesus, you can rule with me. The only thing you have to do is fall down and worship me. And Jesus Christ at that point He understood what Satan is saying. Satan is saying, do not go to the cross. Jesus, you're going to die for these people. Don't die for these. You can rule over them the way I do without dying for them. And he promised Jesus the crown without the cross. And Jesus Christ, the first time he came, He knows that his greatest battle which began here, but his greatest battle will be fought on the cross where Satan through everything he had at the Son of God, but the Son of God conquered Satan's sin and death. 40 days like Elijah, who was also sustained by an angel's provision of food. And it says here He was with the wild animals. And that's generally a sense of close friendly association that the animals were kind to Him, they were nice to Him. And this shows us that Jesus when he came, he came to restore the distortion of the original harmony in the world. And the eschaton, the enmity will be reversed between humanity and the wild animals as promised in Hosea. But Jesus here is presented as the new Adam, that He is the son of man which is a messianic title, but also in a sense Jesus was the son of Adam. Adam was not a son of man, Adam was the son of God and that's made clear in Luke chapter 3 in the genealogy. But Jesus uses this phrase as a messianic title, son of man over and over in Mark 8:31. "He began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and after three days, rise again." Adam was tested by God's adversary, the snake, which is Satan personified and he lost. Adam lived at peace with the wild animals before the fall and he lost that shalom. Adam was raised by God to a preeminent position to be a son of God, but he lost that as well. That's why Jesus when He uses this title that He is the son of man and why that is so significant because in Daniel chapter 7, this was prophesied. "I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and He came to the ancient of days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all people as nations and languages should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and His kingdom one that shall not be destroyed." He's the son of man, but He has an everlasting kingdom to show us that he's not just the son of man, He's also the son of God. And this is the only way that this could happen, the only way that we could have redemption is we need to be represented by someone, someone who is like us, someone who is human, but someone who can also bridge the chasm between us and a holy God. So he would have to be a son of God and he would have to be a son of man, and all that came to culmination on the cross where the son of man takes our penalty for sin upon Himself. And the reason why He came back from the dead was because He's truly the son of God. And here at the end says the angels were ministering to Him. It's from the Greek word to serve, to serve on a concrete level as a waiter serves food and drinks. So most likely after his fast of 40 days, angels came and brought him a feast. Fourth is the kingdom has come. Verse 14, "Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel." John was arrested by Herod's agents for calling out the sin of Herod to calling him to repentance. So Jesus continues the ministry and He says the time is fulfilled. What He's saying and this is the Greek word kairos, "The old evil age of Satan's dominion is over." It's now fulfilled. The new age of God's rule is about to begin and God's rule enters our lives when? The first moment that we repent of our sin and believe in the good news of Jesus Christ, that the law was fulfilled by Christ and he bore the burden for our law-breaking to extend to us the blessing of His law-abiding. This king came to rule, but first initially He came to rule in our hearts. And this is why He doesn't come here with a crown, but He does go to a cross. And on that cross He allows himself to be wounded, allows himself to be fatally wounded. Why? Because that's what it took to heal us. It took the blood of the Son of God and the son of man. He was tempted by Satan to know our temptations, to give us power to overcome our temptations. He experienced suffering to know our suffering and to give us strength to overcome our suffering. He was rejected, mocked, beaten and crucified. He fully understands our pain, and He is able to help. 1 Peter 2:21-25, "For to this you have been called because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, He did not revile in return. When he suffered, he did not threaten but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds, you have been healed for you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the shepherd, an overseer of your souls." Back to Dostoevski, and the idea that if you truly understand the mercy and the grace that God has given you, we are not to use that grace in vain, but we are to follow King Jesus. Dostoevski later in life he wrote this, "When I turn back to look at the past, I think of how much time has been wasted. How much of it lost in misdirected efforts, mistakes and idleness and living the wrong way. And however I treasured life, how much I sinned against my heart and spirit. My heart bleeds now as I think of it. Life is a gift. Life is happiness. Each minute could be an eternity of bliss." And then in his work of fiction, The Idiot, the main character's named Myshkin, and Myshkin talks about an acquaintance who was sentenced to be executed and then pardoned. And one of his friends asked him and he said, how's he doing now? Whatever happened to that friend who told you all his horrors? His punishment was changed, which means he was granted that infinite life. Well, what did he do with so much wealth afterwards? Did he live reckoning up every moment? And Myshkin's response was, "He didn't live that way at all and lost many, many minutes." I pray that the grace of God in your life is not in vain. Let us stop trusting in our own agendas. Let us stop building our own kingdoms. Let us turn from living as if we are our own king. Let's believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ and live for God. Jesus is king, accept His pardon, enter His kingdom, do His will and worship the king. This is how we enter the kingdom, repent and believe in the gospel. It's good news because it's for everybody. Anyone who turns from sin is welcome in and it's good news because you're welcome to live under the kingship of the greatest king ever. And why did Jesus do this? Why did He do all of this? Why did He become God incarnate? Why did He live amongst us? Why did He obey the will of God perfectly in fulfilling the law? Why did He go to the cross? Why? Because He loves us. And when you understand what his love cost us, that gives us power to follow the king. Let us pray. Holy God, we thank you for your holy word, for your holy scriptures, and we thank you Holy Spirit that you're with us. I pray Holy God give us your power to follow you on a daily basis. Give us your power to be agents of kingdom change. Give us your power to seek first above everything else, the kingdom of God. Jesus, we thank you that you came and you went to a cross. And we thank you that now you're seated at the right hand of God and you are wearing a crown. And I pray, let us never forget that vision that Christ is king and let us be a people who would joyfully follow. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Tremendous News: The King Loves You

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 10, 2023 47:34


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you for giving us your holy word, and we thank you for sending us your holy Son. We thank you that your son came as a savior to save us from our sins, but you also came as Lord. And Jesus, we thank you that you went to the cross and you paid the penalty for our law-breaking, our transgressions of the law. And Jesus, you bled. The holy Son of God, you bled on that cross in order to cleanse us, in order to save us, and then also to give us grace. And you came back from the dead as the conquering king and you gave us marching orders to go and make disciples of all nations and to take dominion of this world, to take it back from the usurper, back from Satan, back from the enemy. And I pray, Lord, that you empower us by the Holy Spirit. Baptize us with the Holy Spirit. Send each one of us a special anointing to proclaim your word everywhere we go. To know your word, study your word, meditate upon your word, and to testify to the greatness of our God. Lord Jesus, show us what it means that you are our king. And that when you tell us to follow you, that is a command. Those are marching orders. And wherever in our lives we are not following you, I pray, give us grace. Transform our wills, transform our minds, transform our hearts. Lord Jesus, we pray that you bless the sermon series. We pray that you anoint it and I pray that your holy church will be built up. And I pray those who are far from you will be redeemed and regenerated and transformed from being rebels to being your children. And I pray, Lord, in this season that you send us the gift of evangelism, a passion for evangelists to proclaim the gospel of the king. The king is here. We deserve His wrath, but He came to extend mercy and grace and call us to follow him. I pray that you bless our time in the holy scriptures. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. So we're beginning a sermon series through the Gospel of Mark that we are calling Kingdom Come, the Gospel of Mark and the secret of God's kingdom. And Jesus Christ, when He came, His very first words were the kingdom of God is at hand. So He's established the kingdom, the king is here, and then the Lord Jesus Christ teaches us to pray. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And that prayer is not just a prayer, that's our purpose. Yes, we cry out, Lord, may your kingdom come. But what we're saying is, Lord, give me the power to establish your kingdom. The title of the sermon today is Tremendous News: The King Loves You. And it's tremendous news because we don't deserve that love. It's a shock that He comes as a loving savior. Why? Because we deserve the wrath of God for our law-breaking. And just to give you perspective on this, I take an example from history from Fyodor Dostoevsky. Before he wrote Crime and Punishment, before he wrote The Idiot, before he wrote The Brothers Karamazov, he was actually sentenced to death by a firing squad by Tsar Nicholas I. For what? Listening to stories, criticizing the armed forces, owning an illegal printing press in order to create anti-government propaganda, and contributing to plot against the Tsar. So he was part of a group of rebels. There were 21 members in the circle and Dostoevski is 27 at that time. And they were brought into a public square and they were forced to kneel, kiss a cross, and then undergo a symbolic beheading where swords were broken above their heads. They were tied to pillars in the town square, blindfolded and then they started awaiting their execution. But immediately before they were shot, an envoy from the Tsar arrived with the stay of execution saying, don't shoot. And the men were pardoned by the king from execution and forced to serve in hard labor and a labor camp for four years. And you say, how would that change a man knowing he's about to be executed and all of a sudden there is a stay of execution? Dostoevsky, after the averted execution said, "Today I faced death for three quarters of an hour. I was a hair's breadth away from death, and now I am living again." He wrote his brother after the event, "I'm being reborn in another form." In the same way that the brightest dawn follows the darkest night, the best and the greatest, the most tremendous news always comes right after the deepest realization of the most terrible news. Well, what is the terrible news? That you and I, we have broken the law of God, the holy law of the holy God. This is the ultimate act of insurrection. And God created you with eternal soul. He breathed his spirit into you. We have eternal souls created by an eternal God. So what's the punishment for insurrection against the holy God of the universe? It's banishment from God's kingdom. That's what we deserve. Exile. And how long is that exile? Eternal because God is eternal and so are our souls. We deserve execution. We deserve eternal damnation for rebelling against the holy God. So when the king of kings comes, it's surprising that He doesn't come with execution and eviction notices. When the king comes, the king comes with pardon and amnesty and forgiveness and mercy, but also grace. This is what the gospel is all about, that God is offering to us today, mercy. Mercy is you don't get what you deserve, but He also gives us grace. And grace is we get what we don't deserve. God has mercy on rebels and He gives us grace in adopting us as sons and daughters because of the sacrifice of king Jesus on the cross. Jesus came as a Jewish man, but He's not just the king of the Jews or just the king of Israel. He's the king of everyone and the king of everything. And there's only two kinds of people, children of God or rebels. Soldiers of King Jesus or soldiers of king Satan. And if you turn from your sin and you submit to the king, if you believe in His gospel, something incredible happens. The miracle of the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you are regenerated from within. God gives you a brand new heart with brand new desires and your mind is renewed by the power of God. And God now can look at you as He looks at His son Jesus Christ and say, this is my child in whom I'm well pleased. And grace also is a power source. God gives us grace as energy to become kingdom builders. Jesus Christ said, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and everything else shall be added onto you." St. Paul said, "I am what I am by the grace of God, but the grace of God was not in vain in me. It wasn't given to me in vain. Instead," he says, "I worked harder than the rest of them. "And he's talking about the other apostles. So God gives us grace to do what? To follow Him, build His kingdom. And it all starts with the tremendous news that He's willing to forgive us if we repent. And this news does change us, it rivets us and it changes your whole perspective on reality. Would you please look at the text with me today? We're in Mark 1:1-15, "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. Behold, I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight." John appeared baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now, John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey. And he preached saying, 'After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie. I've baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.' In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens being torn open and the spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, 'You are my beloved son with you, I'm well pleased.' The spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness and he was in the wilderness 40 days being tempted by Satan and he was with the wild animals and the angels were ministering to him. Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying, 'The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel.'" This is the reading of God's holy and inert, infallible, authoritative word, may it write these truths upon our hearts. Four points to frame up our time. First, the king has come. Second, the king is anointed. Third, the king declares war. And fourth, the kingdom has come. First, the king has come. Mark 1:1, the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the son of God written by Mark, who was probably an associate of Peter and Peter at that time was serving in Rome when this gospel was written. So this gospel is written to city dwellers and it's written in such a way where busy people can understand the gospel, understand who is Jesus, understand His person and His work. We see that Mark emphasizes action over teaching, it's very vivid. One of his favorite words is the word immediately. And what he's doing, he's writing to busy people. He's trying to get to the point as quickly as possible. And if you're new to the city, what you recognize is after a while here you realize you know who's from Boston because they walk fast and they talk fast. Fast walkers, fast talkers. And that's kind how I preach. I talk really fast, people tell me they can't 2X me on our podcasts or et cetera, but I want to get to the point as quickly as possible. And the point is, Jesus Christ, He's the point of everything. And here we see the freshness of discovery of who Jesus is. That's what Mark is trying to do. Over 150 times, he uses the historic present tense, putting past events in the present tense. Why? To increase the vividness. That what Jesus did, He's continuing to do today in and through the church as empowered by the Holy Spirit. It begins with the word the beginning. That's the very first word, and it's alluding to Genesis 1:1, that in the beginning God created everything and God created man and it was all beautiful. It was all wonderful, but we rebelled against God and Satan usurped dominion from Adam and Jesus Christ has come as a new Adam, as a new creation, as a new beginning for human beings. His name is Jesus in the English. In the Greek, it's Yesus, and Yesus is a transliteration of the Jewish word, Joshua. So Jesus is named after Joshua. In the Hebrew, His name, what it means is savior or literally Yahweh is salvation. So even in the name, what we see is that God is saying what Moses couldn't do, Joshua did. Moses could not take the promised land, could not bring the people of God into the promised land. Joshua did that. What Moses couldn't do, Jesus is going to do. Moses gave the law, but he couldn't transform hearts to obey God willingly. God can force His kingdom upon us and one day He will come with a flaming sword and He will judge. But the first time Jesus Christ comes, He doesn't come with a sword of power or physical sword. He comes with the sword of the spirit, wielding the word of God so people are transformed from the inside out. Moses gave the law, Jesus gives grace, which leads to heartfelt obedience, which empowers us to fulfill the law out of love for God and neighbor. Jesus Christ, a lot of people think that's His last name. That's not His last name. It wasn't Mary and Joseph Christ. This is a title, a kristos. It's from the Hebrew marcia or an anointed one. He's anointed to do what? He's anointed to be a royal figure. He's anointed to be king. So Jesus Christ actually just means is king. Sometimes they drive by churches and they're named Christ is king. I'm like, that means king is king. It's Jesus is king. That's the point, that He's come in order to establish the kingdom of God. He's the son of God. Son begotten of the Father. The Son of God is God as much as the Father is God, but the Son submits to the father's will. So we see right in the center of the faith, the faith is patriarchal with the Father up top and hierarchal, the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. When Jesus took on flesh, He was male. Jesus was a man, a Jewish man who lived under the law. And Jesus is the Son of God and the son of man, that's His messianic title. And the Holy Spirit is not an it. It's not just a force. The Holy Spirit is a person, the Holy Spirit is a he. And just for clarity's purposes, God's pronouns are He/Him. And I say that because confusion has come from theological schools. I remember taking classes at BU School of Theology and I realized that's not going to go well because the very first prayer I heard was a prayer to mother God. Well, that is not true. God is father. The gospel, the word gospel means good news or literally an announcement of something good associated with a military victory. It's good news of victory from the battlefield. And the nuance of military victory is extremely important for Mark who presents Jesus' ministry as triumph over Satan, over the demonic forces and over their human agents. In Isaiah, the announcer of good news or the one that brings the good news proclaims the victory of Yahweh Israel's true king over hostile forces. And this is just the beginning. It's the beginning of what Jesus taught and what He began to do and He continues to do today. In Mark 1:2, "As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, behold, I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." As it is written, it says. This is typical Jewish formula for citation of scripture. And the Greek, it's a perfect tense, has been written, implies past action with permanent results and suggesting that the ancient scriptures, it's not just a dead letter, but it's a living force in the present. As it has been written through the instrumentality of Isaiah, and then God speaks in the first person, meaning God inspired Isaiah by the spirit and he speaks to us through the word of God. And Mark affirms that what happened in Jesus followed the plan of salvation laid out by God and the prophecies of scriptures in the first 39 books of the Bible. Jesus came and His Bible were the Hebrew scriptures, the first three fourths of the Bible and this is why Mark quotes it in the very beginning. It was all promised. And He says, "I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way." So John the Baptist comes and John the Baptist is this voice and he's in the wilderness. And the word for wilderness or desert is érimos, is used three times in our texts today. And at the outset, all the action is in the wilderness. You say, why is that important? Because Adam was placed on the garden. The garden of Eden and everything was in bliss and everything was perfect. They walked in the presence of God, but he traded that garden for a wilderness by disobeying God. So the second Adam enters the wilderness to turn it back into a garden. Jesus is also the faithful son of God who unlike Israel, obeyed God completely. Israel disobeyed God. They were faithless and they walked in the wilderness for 40 years. But even there in the wilderness, God met them and He gave them the law and he cared for them and He provided for them. So in a sense, Jesus here is presented as the new Joshua, as the one who's going to lead the new exodus out of the wilderness to bring us into the presence of God. And what's the voice of one crying in the wilderness? What's he proclaiming? He's saying, "Prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight. Prepare. God is here, the Lord is here. Prepare the way of the Lord." So Jesus is called Lord right from the outset. Who is John? John comes as an Old Testament prophet in the spirit of Elijah. He was a cousin of Jesus so he knew Jesus, he knew his life. In many ways he was a wild man, but the Lord used that. And what was his message? His message is the king is here, the king is coming. Prepare. Prepare. And what's the assumption? Is that we're not ready, that we need to do something to become ready. The king is coming and we need to present ourselves as best we can for the king. And John's not calling for just a coat of paint. No, we've got structural issues. We need an overhaul, a full gut down to the studs. I remember I took a trip to Sochi, Russia in 2013. It was before the Olympics and I wanted to see what they're doing in preparation for the Olympics and I was doing some missions work. And then we're driving up into the mountains of Sochi and I just noticed that everything's beautiful, everything's tremendous. And then I realized I don't see any houses. There are no houses. All I see is a beautiful fence on both sides. And they realized that if we're going to bring people to the Olympics, we have to make everything presentable, but we don't have time to make the houses presentable or the villages presentable so we're just going to cover it all up with a beautiful veneer. Well, John's not calling us to do that. John is saying, "No, no, no. It's not a veneer, not a facade change, not just your behavior must change. No, no, no. We need a regeneration of the heart." And how does that happen? What does he say? He says, "Repent and be baptized." Mark 1:4. "John appeared baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." So John here, he comes baptizing, and this is the Greek word vaftízo, which means to dip, plunge, immerse, and can be used of dipping a cup in water, et cetera. So John is called the baptizing one. A lot of people think he's baptist, because John the Baptist, there were no Baptist denominations at that time. And by the way, if we're going to call him any denominations, he's definitely not Baptist. He'd get ex-communicated from most Baptist churches. No, he's probably more Pentecostal than anything, but he comes baptizing and you're like, why is he baptizing? What is baptism? Well, baptism at that time was something that the priest did. They washed themselves in ablutions before taking part in sacrifices. And then the latter practice was when Gentiles wanted to become part of the people of God, what was the practice? How did they purge themselves of uncleanness of their pagan life, so to speak? Well, they were immersed in a ritual bath and that became a requirement for their conversion. So what John here is doing is he's going to Jewish people and he's saying, "You have not lived as the children of God. You have not lived as the people of God. You have not lived a life of love and obedience to God and people in submission of God's holy law. You are not saved through genealogy." And so he's calling them to faith in their own God, faith in their own scriptures and says, if he's saying you have lived as Gentiles, you have lived as pagans now through baptism, you are becoming the children of God and it's all started with the heart first. There's a passage in Zechariah that's used extensively in the New Testament that shares several motifs from our text, water imagery and repentance and confession, forgiveness of sins and even reference to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And what this passage emphasizes is even repentance, even asking God for forgiveness, even asking God for mercy and grace, that's a gift in and of itself that it starts with the spirit of God working in our lives. So Zechariah 12:10, "And I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him as one mourns for an only child and weep bitterly for him as one weeps over a firstborn. On that day, the mourning in Jerusalem will be as great as the mourning for Hadad-rimmmon in the plain of Megiddo. The land shall mourn each family by itself, the family of the house of David by itself and their wives by themselves, the family of the house of Nathan by itself and their wives by themselves, the family of the house of Levi by himself and their wives by themselves, and the family of the Shimeites by itself and their wives by themselves and all the families that are left each by itself and their wives by themselves. On that day, there shall be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness." So John's baptism departed slightly from the baptism practice in the day. In the practice of the day, the Gentile convert would baptize themselves. They would go down to the water themselves. But here there's a second party, John is doing the baptizing, which is a symbol that we cannot save ourselves. We need someone from the outside and that's only Jesus Christ. And also John's baptism was only anticipatory of cleansing from sinfulness. It wasn't until the blood of Jesus Christ that we can truly be ransom from our sins. He comes proclaiming and the message is a message of repentance. What is the word repentance? It's literally a change of mind, a turning a direction of life, a returning. Like in the Old Testament, the prophets would come and they would say, repent. Repent. What they're saying is people of God, people of God turn back to God. Turn back to the word of God, implies a total change in spiritual orientation. And when repentance comes, we are forgiven of sins. It literally means ascending away or release, the release from guilt before God. Verse five, "And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem, were going out to him and we're being baptized by him in the river Jordan confessing their sins." And the phrase here for we're going out to him, it's a word that's applied in the Old Testament to the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt under Moses. And what Mark is doing is deliberately invoking Exodus Moses typology. Why? To show us that the new Moses has come, the new Joshua has come, the new exodus is here. In verse six, "Now John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey." I've always thought that he just did that because he's kind of a nut and this is the way that you attract a lot of attention to start a movement, but actually it's a picture of the primal back to earth reminiscent of the garden of Eden. Remember in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve they sinned and God promised that the day that you sin you will die. That day began their spiritual death, but God pardons them and there's a blood sacrifice. He takes two animals and there's bloodshed and he creates clothing out of skins of the animals. This picture here is as if John is standing outside of the Garden of Eden. It's as if he's standing in that presence of the angel with a flaming sword that blocked the entrance and he's saying this is the way that we get back into the Garden of Eden. This is the way we get back into the promised land, into the presence of God himself. Here the description presents John as an Elijah figure, Elijah in 1 Kings 18, if you remember this is the great battle between Yahweh and Baal. And in the same way Elijah was preaching the same message, 1 Kings 18:21, "Elijah came near to all the people and said, 'how long will you go limping between two different opinions?' If the Lord is God, follow him. But if Baal, then follow him. And the people did not answer him a word." John's clothing is similar to that of Elijah. Elijah preached a message of repentance and so does John. Elijah was associated with the wilderness, so is John and with the Jordan. And then also Elijah, when he was taken up to heaven before going he gave a double portion of his spirit to his disciple Elisha, doubling his power. So Jesus here similarly is presented as one greater than John, greater than even this great prophet of God and one that supersedes John. In verse seven, "And he preached saying after me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie". He's mightier than I am, mightier in every sense. He's stronger than I am, and also he's more honorable. He's saying, "I'm not even worthy of taking the leather strap that holds his sandal on his foot and unstrapping it." And in rabbinic sources, the untying of the master shoe is the task of the slave, not of the disciple. One rabbi even wrote a pupil does for his teacher all the tasks that a slave does for his master except untying his shoes. So for the rabbis, this is the lowest of the low. The disciples would not do this And John the Baptist, he's saying Jesus is so much more worthy than I am, so much greater in every sense than I am I'm not even worthy of doing the slave like service. And we got to stop here for a minute and we got to meditate on the implications of the meeting behind Jesus washing the feet of the disciples. If John isn't even worthy of doing this, for that's how great Jesus is. Jesus, why would you wash the disciples' feet? You're the king of the universe, why are you stooping down? Why did you take a basin of water? Why are you doing that? And John 13:12-17, "When he had washed their feet and put on His outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, 'Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me teacher and Lord and you are right for so I am. If I then your Lord and teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet for I have given you an example and you also should do just as I've done to you. Truly, truly I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.' If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them." What kind of king is this? This is the king that came to build a kingdom of hearts. This is a king that came to save us from our sins, to wash us from our uncleanness and stark in contrast to any other king. In Mark 1:8, "I've baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit." So Jesus is the anointed one, anointed with the Holy Spirit. That's what makes Him of the Messiah and the spirit endowed Messiah is the spirit endowing Messiah. And in the New Testament there's a linkage of spirit and water. 1 Corinthians 12:12, "For just as the body is one and has many members and all the members of the body, though many are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one spirit we were all baptized into one body. Jews and Greeks, slaves and free and all were made to drink of one spirit." Titus 3:4-7, "But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our savior appeared, he saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy. By the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life." Ezekiel 36, "This was promised, I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness and from all your idols I will cleanse you and I will give you a new heart. And a new spirit I will put within you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules." This is the promise of God that when we come to Him, when we repent of our sins and we beg Him for grace and mercy that He sends us the Holy Spirit. And I wonder, do you have the Holy Spirit? Have you been baptized with the Holy Spirit? Is the power of God, the indwelling power of God within you? And if you're not sure, look to the cross of Jesus Christ, ask for forgiveness of sins and say, Lord God, send me the spirit. Make me a person that is filled with the spirit of God to do the work that the Lord has for us. Second is the king is anointed and we see the baptism of Jesus in verse nine. "In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan and when He came up out of the water immediately he saw the heavens being torn open and the spirit descending on Him like a dove and a voice came from heaven. 'You are my beloved son. With you, I am well pleased.'" Here we see again the word immediately, it's Mark's favorite word. The word is used 51 times in the New Testament, and Mark uses it 41 times and what he's showing is that the spirit is at work and he can't be stopped. It says that the sky, the heavens were being torn open, being ripped apart. It's harsh words and not the one for opening of heavens in a visionary context, but it's literally the heavens tore open and all of a sudden we see the presence of God descending on Christ. Isaiah 64 cries out for this day, "Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at your presence as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil. To make your name known to your adversaries and that the nations might tremble in your presence." Mark uses this verb to tear apart twice in his gospel. Here he uses it and then he uses it that one time where Jesus is on the cross and He says it's finished, He's completed the work of redemption and then says that the veil in the temple was torn, ripped apart from top to bottom. What Mark is giving us is a glimpse into the very heart of reality, the meaning of life, the essence of the universe. According to scripture, it's the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit they are at the center of everything. And it's more as though invisible curtain right in front of us is pulled back and God reveals His person and His will. Christian life is like this, learning to differentiate between physical reality, which is not all there is and spiritual reality. And by God's grace we can walk by faith and not by sight. And we see the spirit descending upon Christ like a dove. It says why the dove? Well, the dove is an appropriate symbol for the spirit as it can cross the barrier between heaven and earth. And also, it's an echo of Genesis 1 where the spirit soars bird like fluttering over the waters. The trinity created the world. It was God and God's spirit and God's word, and here the Trinity is restoring the world. We see the Father speak, He is the voice, the son who is the word, and the spirit fluttering like a dove. And what does God say? God speaks and He says, "You are my beloved son." It's a near exact quotation of Psalm 2, which is a messianic psalm. Psalm 2:7 says, "I will tell of the decree the Lord said to me, you are my son, today I have begotten you." Psalm 2 was interpreted messianically in Judaism and in the Psalm the kingship of the anointed one is congruent with that of God. He says, you are my son. And then he includes the word beloved. And where have we heard this before? This is Genesis 22 where God says to Abraham, "The son, your beloved son whom you've been waiting for, I want you to bring him as a sacrifice to me." That's when God tested Abraham and obviously God stopped the sacrifice of Abraham, but that was typology. That was an example of what God the Father would not stop from doing. God the Father would bring down the sword of God's wrath upon his own son in order to redeem us. You're the beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. This is the good pleasure of God revealed, and the first time that was revealed was His delight in creation where He said is very good. So His life giving conviction that is very good that my son is baptized in the Holy Spirit and He's prepared to do battle against the evil one. At the center of the Godhead is a father delighting in His beloved son. And fathers, we are called to be godly and we are called to delight in our children. And children we're called to be godly and to be a delight to our fathers and mothers. And the whole Christian gospel can be summed up like this, when the living God looks at us at every believing and baptized Christian, He says to us what He says to Jesus here. The gospel promises us an imputation of the righteousness of God. The very second that you repent of your sins, your sin was transferred to Christ on the cross and His righteousness is transferred to you. So in a sense, the moment you're justified, God looks at you and says, no matter how you lived, no matter how many commandments you've broken, it says, you are my dear, dear child, I'm delighted with you. And then it begins the process of sanctification where we grow to become a greater delight to our father so that one day we can hear from God the Father. "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your father." The king is here, the king is anointed, the king is God's son. And what does the king do? Immediately after His anointing, He challenges the opposing king, which is Satan, and this point three, the king declares war. Verse 12, "The spirit immediately drove Him out into the wilderness and He was in the wilderness 40 days being tempted by Satan and He was with the wild animals and the angels were ministering to Him. The spirits that drove Him out, ekballei it's the same word that Mark uses to speak of exorcism. It's like a forceful ejection. On the one hand, the Holy Spirit is like a dove gently descending on Christ, but then the Holy Spirit sends Jesus immediately into battle against the enemy. It's the same spirit. And the king here goes on the offensive. Satan means adversary and he's the prince of the fallen angels, the supreme enemy both of God and man. When God created Adam and Eve, He told Adam, "Work and guard the garden, take dominion." And he didn't take dominion of Satan. They obeyed the lies of the evil one and Satan, usurped power, he took dominion of this world. And Jesus here immediately goes to fight the king of this world. And Matthew 4 gives us an explanation of what happened. Jesus in the fasted state for 40 days and Satan comes to Him and tempts Him, Jesus fought Satan with the word of God over and over and over. But what was the temptation? The temptation was Jesus, do not obey the will of the Father perfectly. Jesus join my team. Jesus, you can rule with me. The only thing you have to do is fall down and worship me. And Jesus Christ at that point He understood what Satan is saying. Satan is saying, do not go to the cross. Jesus, you're going to die for these people. Don't die for these. You can rule over them the way I do without dying for them. And he promised Jesus the crown without the cross. And Jesus Christ, the first time he came, He knows that his greatest battle which began here, but his greatest battle will be fought on the cross where Satan through everything he had at the Son of God, but the Son of God conquered Satan's sin and death. 40 days like Elijah, who was also sustained by an angel's provision of food. And it says here He was with the wild animals. And that's generally a sense of close friendly association that the animals were kind to Him, they were nice to Him. And this shows us that Jesus when he came, he came to restore the distortion of the original harmony in the world. And the eschaton, the enmity will be reversed between humanity and the wild animals as promised in Hosea. But Jesus here is presented as the new Adam, that He is the son of man which is a messianic title, but also in a sense Jesus was the son of Adam. Adam was not a son of man, Adam was the son of God and that's made clear in Luke chapter 3 in the genealogy. But Jesus uses this phrase as a messianic title, son of man over and over in Mark 8:31. "He began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and after three days, rise again." Adam was tested by God's adversary, the snake, which is Satan personified and he lost. Adam lived at peace with the wild animals before the fall and he lost that shalom. Adam was raised by God to a preeminent position to be a son of God, but he lost that as well. That's why Jesus when He uses this title that He is the son of man and why that is so significant because in Daniel chapter 7, this was prophesied. "I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and He came to the ancient of days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all people as nations and languages should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and His kingdom one that shall not be destroyed." He's the son of man, but He has an everlasting kingdom to show us that he's not just the son of man, He's also the son of God. And this is the only way that this could happen, the only way that we could have redemption is we need to be represented by someone, someone who is like us, someone who is human, but someone who can also bridge the chasm between us and a holy God. So he would have to be a son of God and he would have to be a son of man, and all that came to culmination on the cross where the son of man takes our penalty for sin upon Himself. And the reason why He came back from the dead was because He's truly the son of God. And here at the end says the angels were ministering to Him. It's from the Greek word to serve, to serve on a concrete level as a waiter serves food and drinks. So most likely after his fast of 40 days, angels came and brought him a feast. Fourth is the kingdom has come. Verse 14, "Now, after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel." John was arrested by Herod's agents for calling out the sin of Herod to calling him to repentance. So Jesus continues the ministry and He says the time is fulfilled. What He's saying and this is the Greek word kairos, "The old evil age of Satan's dominion is over." It's now fulfilled. The new age of God's rule is about to begin and God's rule enters our lives when? The first moment that we repent of our sin and believe in the good news of Jesus Christ, that the law was fulfilled by Christ and he bore the burden for our law-breaking to extend to us the blessing of His law-abiding. This king came to rule, but first initially He came to rule in our hearts. And this is why He doesn't come here with a crown, but He does go to a cross. And on that cross He allows himself to be wounded, allows himself to be fatally wounded. Why? Because that's what it took to heal us. It took the blood of the Son of God and the son of man. He was tempted by Satan to know our temptations, to give us power to overcome our temptations. He experienced suffering to know our suffering and to give us strength to overcome our suffering. He was rejected, mocked, beaten and crucified. He fully understands our pain, and He is able to help. 1 Peter 2:21-25, "For to this you have been called because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, He did not revile in return. When he suffered, he did not threaten but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds, you have been healed for you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the shepherd, an overseer of your souls." Back to Dostoevski, and the idea that if you truly understand the mercy and the grace that God has given you, we are not to use that grace in vain, but we are to follow King Jesus. Dostoevski later in life he wrote this, "When I turn back to look at the past, I think of how much time has been wasted. How much of it lost in misdirected efforts, mistakes and idleness and living the wrong way. And however I treasured life, how much I sinned against my heart and spirit. My heart bleeds now as I think of it. Life is a gift. Life is happiness. Each minute could be an eternity of bliss." And then in his work of fiction, The Idiot, the main character's named Myshkin, and Myshkin talks about an acquaintance who was sentenced to be executed and then pardoned. And one of his friends asked him and he said, how's he doing now? Whatever happened to that friend who told you all his horrors? His punishment was changed, which means he was granted that infinite life. Well, what did he do with so much wealth afterwards? Did he live reckoning up every moment? And Myshkin's response was, "He didn't live that way at all and lost many, many minutes." I pray that the grace of God in your life is not in vain. Let us stop trusting in our own agendas. Let us stop building our own kingdoms. Let us turn from living as if we are our own king. Let's believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ and live for God. Jesus is king, accept His pardon, enter His kingdom, do His will and worship the king. This is how we enter the kingdom, repent and believe in the gospel. It's good news because it's for everybody. Anyone who turns from sin is welcome in and it's good news because you're welcome to live under the kingship of the greatest king ever. And why did Jesus do this? Why did He do all of this? Why did He become God incarnate? Why did He live amongst us? Why did He obey the will of God perfectly in fulfilling the law? Why did He go to the cross? Why? Because He loves us. And when you understand what his love cost us, that gives us power to follow the king. Let us pray. Holy God, we thank you for your holy word, for your holy scriptures, and we thank you Holy Spirit that you're with us. I pray Holy God give us your power to follow you on a daily basis. Give us your power to be agents of kingdom change. Give us your power to seek first above everything else, the kingdom of God. Jesus, we thank you that you came and you went to a cross. And we thank you that now you're seated at the right hand of God and you are wearing a crown. And I pray, let us never forget that vision that Christ is king and let us be a people who would joyfully follow. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Mosaic Boston Vision

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 3, 2023 58:57


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Our Heavenly Father, you are a holy God and we marvel at your holiness and we are in awe at your glory. And we stand in amazement that though we rebelled against your reign and your rule, against your dominion over us, you Lord, did not leave us in our ignorance and darkness, but you provided a way for us to be saved. You did it through the life, the death, the burial, and the ascension of your son Jesus Christ. Lord Jesus, we thank you for revealing the fullness of the law of God to us. We thank you that you came, not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it, to ratify it, to show us that the law of God is good, and that we have transgressed it, and we deserve the wrath of God for that transgression. But Lord Jesus, you and your mercy and your love and your kindness went to the cross on our behalf. And today, as we remember your sacrifice on the cross, let us never lose sight of the fact that you were motivated by love toward God and neighbor. This is the epitome of what it means to love, Jesus. Thank you for defining love for us. That love is to lay down your life for those whom you love. And Lord Jesus, we thank you that you taught us the holy scriptures, and you expounded on the holy scriptures, and then you gave us the Holy Spirit, the indwelling power of God who is with us. Holy Spirit, today I pray that you light our hearts on fire for the mission that you have before us. The great mission and the great commandment and the great commission, empower us to fulfill your will here in the city. Give us a vision of what it means to be a city within a city, a humanity within a humanity, a people within a people, a people who submit to you, submit to your word and do everything that we do out of love for God and neighbor. And Lord, continue to use our lives to build up your kingdom. Show us how you have called each one of us individually to build according to the blueprints that you have given us. Lord, bless our service and bless the sermon, and we pray this in Christ's holy name. Amen. Today is our annual Mosaic Boston vision sermon. And every Sunday we meet here at this wonderful temple, Temple Ohabei Shalom. I always know who's new because they come in and they're mesmerized by the building. They haven't learned to see the flaws in the building as I have. I look at the roof and I'm like, "Oh, please don't collapse on us." Or the seats, that they're not the most comfortable. But it's a wonderful building. And temple Temple Ohabei Shalom means, the temple of the lovers of peace. And every Sunday we here open up Yahweh's holy word, God's holy word, which outlines the plan of God's peace, the plan of God's true shalom, which is universal flourishing. On our branding, we put our values which are love Jesus simple. Love, why? Because that's the point of the whole thing. God is love. And then God, out of love, gives his son, Jesus, motivated by love, lays down his life on our behalf, and God extends that love to us in forgiveness and by grace through faith in Christ. And then Jesus Christ is the word of God. He's the one that reveals God's word to us, confirms God's word. He shows us that everything that preceded him was true. And he does that by coming back from the dead. And what Jesus does is he shows us though God is love, love is not God. Jesus defines what it means to love God, what it means to love neighbor as self. And then by simple we mean that the Holy Spirit loves to simplify. Truth is simple. Satan loves to obfuscate. Satan loves to add rules upon rules, human tradition, manmade rules, and people lose sight of what it means to love God. And by simplicity, we have a very simple method of ministry here at Mosaic, we do what the early church did, we gather for worship publicly in the temple and then we meet in small groups around the city during the week. And that's how we practice community. And then service, we volunteer here and we volunteer our time, and we do want to see the next generation of believers built up. We volunteer at Mini Mosaic. A little more later on that. We are recruiting more volunteers for Mini Mosaic, which is a crucial ministry. But what is our vision? Where are we going? And by vision, I do not mean I foresee the future. By vision, I mean I believe that the Lord has impressed on my heart and mind blueprints for how we are to operate, how we are to build this church, how we are to build the kingdom. And this is how often God works. Moses goes up on the mountain and he is given the blueprint for the law of God, the 10 Commandments, the moral law. Moses goes up on the mountain again and he's given the architectural plans, the blueprints for the tabernacle. How are we to build the tabernacle? David, in the same way, receives from the Lord, the blueprints for how are we going to build the temple of God. Ezekiel gets a vision of the temple in the city, of the land and he gets blueprints. And then God's spirit comes upon God's people and God says, "I've given you opportunities, talents, I have given you skills, I have given you resources." And then the Holy Spirit helps you find your place in how you then practically build the kingdom of God. Our vision, and I'll unpack every word, "Mosaic Boston aspires to joyfully become a worldwide kingdom building force by proclaiming, believing and obeying the whole council of God, and thereby building men and women of God committed to the great mission, the great commandment and the great commission." So first of all, we aspire to do everything we do joyfully. Psalm 100 verse one and two, "Make a joyful noise to the Lord all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come into his presence with singing." Philippians 4:4, "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice." There's this one episode in holy scripture where God gives the power of the Holy Spirit, to the disciples and they go and they're doing miracles, and they started casting out demons in the name of Jesus Christ because the name of Jesus is above every other name. And then they come back to Jesus and they're like, "Jesus, even the demons obey us." You know what Jesus says? "Rejoice not that the demons obey you, rejoice that your names are written in heaven." So everything we do, we do as propelled out of the outflow of our joy, in that we get to be the children of God. We were adopted into the family of God and he's given us a wonderful mission. We aspire joyfully to become a worldwide kingdom building force. One of the reasons that God puts Israel, the people of God, in the Promised Land initially was because of the geographic location. In many profound ways, Israel, the promised land stood at the crossroads of the whole world. Israel stood at the crossroads of continents and of historic empires. Israel is right in the middle, connecting Africa, Asia, and to a certain degree, even Europe. It's a land bridge and that's why it's called the cradle of civilization. And some of the most important trade routes in the world went straight through Israel. And why did God place them there? God placed them there because he wanted them to stand at the crossroads, to shape and influence the cultural forces of the day, and witness to God, witness to Yahweh, witness to the fact that there is only one God and he has created everything and he has given us a law, and we have transgressed that law, and we deserve the penalty for breaking the law of God is death. So we need redemption. Isaiah 43:10, "You are my witnesses, declares the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen that you may know and believe me and understand that I am He. Before me know God was formed." Exodus 19, five through six, "Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine. And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." So Israel was commissioned by God to testify to the world about who God is and then minister to the world as priests proclaiming the excellencies of God. Jesus echoes the same words to the disciples after his resurrection, Acts 1:8 "But you'll receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth." St. Peter in First Peter 2:9 says, "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." In Revelation one, four through six, John, to the seven churches that are in Asia, "Grace to you in peace from him who is and who was and who is to come. And from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom priest to his God and father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever." Amen. And God still wants his children to be his witnesses, to be a kingdom of priests, proclaiming the truths of God's word. And he wants to call us, and he's calling us to stand at the crossroads of life. And Boston, in many ways, is the crossroads of the world. People from all over the world come here for education, career, success, money, opportunities. This week, end of August, beginning of September, this week before Labor Day, I always play the same game every year. I try to count the moving trucks. How many moving trucks can I count? This week, I'm telling you, I don't know what happened, a hundred plus. I stopped counting after a hundred. And the moving trucks, they're all here. And if you know anything about U-Haul, they give keys to anybody. You got a heartbeat, you got a license, 18 years old, just graduated high school, here's keys to a truck. And then they show up in Boston. They don't know how to drive here. People have lived here for 10 years, don't know how to drive here. You got to know the ins and outs. You've got to be a master driver to make it here. And so it's chaos, but we are to extend grace. But what I'm saying is, is there a more strategic place in the world to plant your life and to commit to serve as a witness to King Jesus? Jesus is Lord, this is what we're... Jesus told the disciples early on, "Go and make disciples of all nations." We live in a place where the nations come to us. And over the years I've got so many stories, but one just came to mind recently. A few weeks ago we had this couple that was with us for a couple weeks and they were just visiting. And what they said was, "We were part of this church seven years ago and God so blessed us seven years ago that we've been following the ministry," and they felt called by God to go to Sydney, Australia and they're part of a church planning team. And they said, "We have a confession to make all the resources you put online, we just steal it. We just take it." And I was like, "Good, it's not mine. It belongs to the kingdom. Use it for kingdom purposes." Incredible influence worldwide just by preaching the gospel here. And what are we preaching? We're preaching that Jesus is king. Jesus is king above all kings. He's Lord above all lords. And there are only two kingdoms. There's God and his kingdom, there's Satan in his kingdom. There's no neutral territory. It's either you're with Christ and you're in the kingdom of God or you're against Christ and you're in the kingdom of Satan. And what we preach is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Anybody who believes, anybody who receives the grace of God, anyone who repents of sin and submits to Christ, you're transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of his beloved son. That's Colossians one, 13 and 14. "He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." And once you're in his kingdom, we work the rest of our lives to submit everything in our lives and in our spheres of influence to King Jesus. At every single one of our membership classes, we use the metaphor of cruise ship verse battleship to explain how we view the church. A lot of places where the church has been around for a long time and they're resourced, what happens is you can professionalize every single part of the ministry and you cater to everyone's needs, and you go to the church, it's like a show. You have a good time and then you're gone. It's like on a cruise ship. Why do people go on a cruise? To rest and to be entertained, to eat tremendously, to have a good time. Well, church is not like a cruise ship. We're not here to entertain you. We're here to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and the full counsel of God. And God has given us a mission. And on a battleship, what unites the people? What unites the people is the mission. Why are we here? What's our purpose? And the Lord Jesus Christ tells us we have an enemy. And if you're new to the city, welcome to spiritual war. There is a battle for the souls. And I feel this every end of August, beginning of September. I feel it. I see it. There's prophetic dreams. It's people from all over the world. Powerful souls are brought here, and now there's a battle for their souls. Which kingdom are you going to serve? Which king are you going to follow? But recently I've realized we're not just a battleship. In my church office, I have a beautiful painting. It's a sunset in the back, it's gorgeous. And then this is just a massive aircraft carrier, rusted, beat up from battles, but it's going, it's steadfastly, steadily moving, powerfully moving forward. And then planes land on the aircraft carrier and that they descend and ascend. That's how I view ministry in Boston. People from all over the world. It's like their plane lands in our aircraft carrier and then the mechanics go to work. They see what's wrong with the engine, they fix things up, they fuel you up, give you new directions and new inspiration, passion, desire to continue serving the Lord. In a similar way to the people of Israel worshiping in a beautiful temple in Jerusalem at the crossroads of their world, we find ourselves worshiping God the same God at the crossroads of the world here. So we see the strategic importance of a church proclaiming the gospel of God, the full counsel of God here. By making an impact here, we truly are making an impact worldwide. Now, how do we do that? How do we want to make an impact for the kingdom of God, a worldwide impact? How? By the word of God. Proclaiming, believing and obeying the whole council of God. In Acts 20, St. Paul, after spending some time with believers in Ephesus, he's leaving them, and then he says the following to them, "Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God." What an interesting way of phrasing his ministry, explaining his ministry. Had he not taught them the whole council of God, there would have been some kind of responsibility on him. He would have been guilty of their blood. And he says, "I didn't shrink." Why with that language? Because there is sometimes a temptation to back off from doctrines that make people squirm. We approach preaching the word of God as we do with the goal of proclaiming the whole council of God. From Genesis to Revelation, this is the inerrant, infallible, authoritative word of God. This is the foundation of everything that we do. Do you not think I know which doctrines make people squirm? Oh, I know. I've done this long enough. I can tell by body language, uncomfortable, uncomfortable. Sometimes people make it very obvious they get up and they're flip me the bird on the way out. You guys don't see that. I see that. My life would be much easier if I did not touch the difficult doctrines. But to remain faithful to God and to remain innocent of the blood of all, I can't but stand on the word of God. This is what we do at the church, we stand on the word of God. Why? Because we want to deepen in you, not just your faith, but your obedience. And that's what true faith always leads to, obedience to the Lord. And we saw this with Romans, the bookends and Romans one and Romans 16, the phrase obedience of faith. Romans 1:5, "Through whom we have received grace in apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations." And then Romans 16:26, "But has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings, has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith." And by proclaiming, obeying and believing the word of God and the whole council, we thereby aspire to build men and women of God committed particular three things, the great mission, the great commandment and the great commission. And I start with the great mission. It's usually known as the cultural mandate. The word culture isn't in it and the word mandate isn't in there either. And I actually think that this title diminishes the weight of the charge. God creates Adam and Eve, he creates humanity. And then the first imperative that he gives them, the first charge, the first mission, is found in Genesis 1:26 through 28. And because it's the very first imperative, it carries primacy. The creation mandate as some have called it, is rather a dominion mandate. It's a mission to take dominion, commanding human beings to bring every sphere of society, as well as nature itself, into subjugation to Jesus Christ. So this is Genesis 1:26 through 28, what I call the great mission. "And then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female, he created them, and God blessed them, God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth." There are three questions of supreme importance to every single person. One, who is God? Second, who am I? And third, what does God require of us? And holy scripture here answers these three questions in the very opening chapter, and how you answer these questions impacts the trajectory of your life and eternity. We learn in the opening chapter of holy scriptures that God is, he is the supreme creator of all things seen and unseen, including humanity. And we also learn that man is unique in all of God's creation being made in the image of God. And therefore God has given us a unique responsibility of doing what? Taking dominion, exercising dominion over the world that God has made. And that's why twice it's repeated. This is why I've created you, to take dominion. This is the blessing, take dominion. God creates man in his image and after his likeness so that man would fill the earth with his offspring, continue to image forth more of God and exercise dominion over the created order. God has ultimate authority and he's given us delegated authority. His authority is absolute, ours is derived from God. He says, let us make man in our image after our likeness. There's a divine counsel. God uses the plural here, let us make. The divine counsel precedes the creation. And it's striking that it's plural, and the interpretation is from the whole council of God that this is the Holy Trinity. It's not a full revelation of the Trinity, but the doctrine of the Trinity makes sense of this text best. And man is to image God in at least three ways. First of all, God made us rational creatures. We can think, we can reason. We are to understand truth. We are to pursue truth. We are to develop our powers of discernment. God has also made us moral beings, that God has written His law upon our hearts. We know when we sin, we know when we have transgressed the law of God. And then God has also given us the charge of dominion. He's given us a royal office to bring everything in subjugation to him. Let them have dominion, in the Hebrew it's [foreign language] to master, to reign, to prevail against, to rule, to create order where there's chaos. And it begins with what? It begins with taking dominion of yourself. You are responsible for you. That you are responsible to submit yourself to the Lord. And when you do, he fills you with the power of God to continue taking dominion. He says, let them start with the fish, the birds and the livestock over all the earth. God made life to feed us. He made plants to eat in Genesis 1:29, and animals are given to as food after the flood in Genesis nine. And he does want us to take good care of the animals under our charge. God is a loving God. He even cares about animals. Proverbs 12:10, "Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, but the mercy of the wicked is cruel." I don't have any beasts at my house, but I have fish. I have five fish, and it is a godly thing to feed your little beast. They get really excited. I feed them. My youngest daughter is four. She's like, "Dad, don't feed them. I want that to be my job." She likes to... We are to master. We are to subdue. We are to care for what God has entrusted to us, and we are to develop its latent potential. And every type of being is to be subservient to humanity. Humans are not on the same level with dogs. We're not on the same level with animals. We are higher. We're not on the same level as the earth itself. We are beings that tower high above all other creatures. We are to be their king and their crown. We are kings of creation under God, and we have a delegated authority for restoring created and creation order, to rule with benevolence, not like a despot out for his own gain. Fill the earth, subdue, rule over it. It's stewardship. Dominion doesn't mean destruction, it means responsibility. And also it means to create. Genesis 1:27, look, three times the verb create is used. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God He created him, male and female, he created them." It's significant that God, for the very first time we find out that God is a creator. He creates, and he creates us in his own image and we are to be agents of creation and recreation. Man was created to image God, and image God by exercising true dominion under God's authority, for God's glory. We are to promote the worship of God. The service of God is to be maintained. And we are to develop and improve the creation around us. Improvement and development takes place when we're empowered by the king of kings. And then once we do take dominion, we submit everything to the feet of Christ. In order to subdue the earth, we must first understand its processes. This is why research is foundational for fulfilling the divine mandate. And then once we get that knowledge, we must apply in technology and engineering and medicine and agriculture, must be implemented for use, and business and commerce transmitted to future generations via education. The creation can also be described and praised in the humanities and fine arts. We are to further the good, the true and the beautiful. The dominion mandate thus authorizes all honorable human occupations as stewardship under God. So we must learn how the world operates, which requires expertise and knowledge and engineering and mathematics, physics, aerodynamics and agriculture. And then we teach our offspring to be involved in these areas as well. The tragedy is that leadership in practically all of these fields in our city and in our world has largely been taken over by secularists and humanists. People that don't honor God, they're not taking dominion for God, they're taking dominion for the enemy. So God's primeval commission here, the great mission has been, in many ways subverted. And Christians today need a new renewed vision and commitment, not only to Christ second coming, yes, he's coming. He's going to fix everything. And not just to the great commission. Yes, that's important. But once people are disciples of Christ, we are to teach them to obey everything that he taught us from the very beginning. So we need a renewed vision of the great mission of responsible world stewardship. So whatever your chosen field, you should aspire to be the very best. The mindset is whatever your job, whatever your field, I'm not just here to take part, I'm here to take over. I'm here to take dominion of whatever God has called me to. In Colossians 3:17, "Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God, the Father, through him." First Peter 4:10 and 11, "As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies, in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen." So as we study creation, as we use our talents in creation to subdue it under the feet of Christ, we become agents of this common grace. We are to make the world a better place by using our skills and talents to build things that are beautiful and useful, while countering the forces of evil and sin that oppress and distort creation. We live in a fallen cursed world, and it's only by the power of the Holy Spirit can we seek to reverse the effects of the curse. And Genesis 1:28, at the heart of the great mission, "and God blessed them and God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the heavens, over every living thing that moves on the earth." The primary purpose of marriage is given here in Malachi 2:15, it's reiterated, "Did he not make them one with a portion of the spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. So guard yourselves in your spirit and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth." If God's will is godly children, then of course it makes sense that Satan would do everything in his powers to prevent this, from sexual perversion to gender confusion, to abortion to divorce. And men and women of God must carry this work out. We must work together and have children who are then trained in a godly Christian fashion to carry out the dominion mandate. Overpopulation is not a concern for God, nor should it be a concern for us. The very idea of depopulation is demonic because Satan came to steal, kill and destroy. The words, fill the earth, incidentally suggest that fears of population explosion are much overdrawn. Evidently the world is well able to support a large population. And Satan's always behind depopulation. Why? Because Satan's not omnipresent. Satan can only be in one place at one time. He's not God. And the demonic, well that's numbered, they're numbered. And the more godly people there are, the more the demonic forces are outnumbered. It's the same power, the strategy over and over. Remember in Egypt when Israel was in the captivity, they were enslaved by Pharaoh. Now Pharaoh realized that they were multiplying so much more than the people of Egypt. What does he do? Force depopulation. We're going to kill the children of Israel. And Moses was saved by his mom. This mandate to be fruitful and multiply, this mission, is so important God repeats it twice after the great flood in Genesis nine. And how are we to go about this whole process of subduing and taking dominion and being fruitful and multiplying? It's all to be done with love, never harshly, but always tenderly, carefully and faithfully. The nature of man's dominion, if he is to be Lord of all, he must be servant of all. This was true in the garden before the fall as it is today. Remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ concerning the exercise of authority in Matthew 20:25, "But Jesus called them to him and said, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave. Even as the son of man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom." For many godly authority is true authority, but it's not based on force or coercion or manipulation. And to understand dominion, we can look at Ephesians five and draw analogies there. That dominion is not exploitive, it's not oppressive, it's always loving. Christ in the church, for example. Christ is the head of the church and Christ's headship of the church leads the church to thrive, to be fruitful, to become evermore lovely. Or the relationship between husband and wife, also Ephesians five. Under her husband's righteous headship, a wife is to thrive and be fruitful and become evermore lovely. And we've been given dominion over creation. If we exercise godly dominion over creation, under the lordship of Christ, creation will thrive and be fruitful and become evermore lovely. Knowledge and appreciation of our fellow creatures is essential. And it's all to be done in love. Romans 5:17, "For if because of one man's trespass, death reigned through the one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ." Romans right there, he says, if you've given grace, God gives you grace to save you. You're in the kingdom of God now, and now we are to expand God's kingdom by taking dominion. We are to reign in life. And it's a mindset shift. If you think about everything you are and everything you have, where in your life is there chaos? And where in your life do you need to take dominion, that you need to take responsibility? You know those days where you do not want to work out, it's the last thing... Instead of working out, you just want a large cheese pizza. And at those moments you got to remind yourself... Once in a while you got to take a break. But as a pattern rhythm of life, we have to take dominion of our bodies. I will tell my body what to do. Take dominion of your health. Take dominion of your mind, as much as you can, take dominion of your soul. Now I started thinking about just even house chores like this. I see trash and I'm like, "Ah, got to take dominion. That's my job, those dishes to do. I'm taking dominion of these dishes." But if you start thinking like that, I'm like, "Huh, all right, where in my life is life out of control? Where do I need dominion? Holy Spirit, give me strength." So take good care of what God has given you. Take good care of your possessions, of your finances. Take good care of your relationships and desire greater influence. Desire greater dominion. Seek to expand your domain of dominion. First Chronicles 4:10, there's a gentleman named Jabez and he prayed the following, "Jabez called upon the God of Israel saying, oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my border and that your hand might be with me and that you would keep me from harm so that it might not bring me pain. And God granted what he asked." Do you ask God, "Lord enlarge my borders, Lord, give me more influence. Give me more of a domain to take dominion of?" Adam was given the charge to do this, the great mission, but he was given the charge of the perfect world. Therefore, his job was a gardener in the perfect world where everything was perfect. He didn't need a house in the garden of Eden, they lived outside. They didn't need air conditioning. Everything... The temperature was perfect. For Adam, it was 67. For Eve, it was around 73. God kept everyone... But everything was perfect. And God gave Adam a job. In Genesis 2:15, the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it, work it and guard it." So Adam's task was given to him before the fall. Before the curse, there were no weeds. He didn't have to toil by the sweat of his brow. Pregnancy or childbirth did not come with pains. Yeah they lived in a different world. There was no need to build shelter to survive in a harsh environment. And Adam did not do his job even in the perfect environment. He did not take dominion. He abdicated his responsibility. When Satan came and tempted Eve and him, he did not fight Satan, and therefore dominion of the world of the created order moved from Adam to Satan. That's why Jesus, when he came, three times in John 12, John 14, John 16, calls Satan the ruler of this world. This was supposed to be man's role, but Adam's willful sin led to him forfeiting the dominion. And then Jesus Christ comes and he comes to destroy the works of the evil one. And I find it fascinating, how did Jesus take dominion up until age 30? Jesus started his ministry at age 30. That's when he started teaching the word of God, telling everyone the kingdom's at hand, repentant and believe. But Jesus Christ, in crucial years of his youth, what did he do as vocation? He was a carpenter. He was a builder. Adam lived in a perfect world. He didn't have to build houses. Everything was perfect. Jesus Christ comes in the fallen world. How is he taking dominion? He is building. He's building structures in the real world to house real families. And that was part of God's blueprint. How do you expand the kingdom of God? By building, in order to house, to house families and house people and house the church. So now we are tasked with the same work, take dominion, in a fallen world, and we take it from Satan, we take ground for Jesus Christ. And real estate is part of it. We, as a church, we do have a vision of taking dominion... Yes, I want to take Boston. This is the reason why I moved here in 2009. My pitch to everybody was, we are taking Boston and we're going to proclaim the gospel of God until we fill Fenway Park with converts. Everyone in Fenway Park is going to get saved. Everybody. That's the vision. We want to take this city. But part of taking the city is taking dominion, getting rooted, getting real estate. And just one example of where I see this in scripture, Jeremiah 29, God sends the prophet Jeremiah as a prophet to proclaim to the people of God in captivity. They were taken from the promised land to Babylon. And he says, this is God's plan for how you are going to build the kingdom in Babylon. Everyone knows Jeremiah 29:11, it's on every Christian mug that you find. "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare, not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." But the plans are actually outlined in the same chapter. That's why I'm like, you can't just pick and choose verse. He gives us the plan. He gives us the plan in verse four and seven, Jeremiah 29:4, "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, build houses and live in them, plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters and take wives through your sons and give your daughters in marriage that you may bear sons and daughters. Multiply there and do not decrease, but seek the welfare of the city where I've sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf for in its welfare you will find your welfare." So we do pray for the Lord to give you a vision, to be rooted here, to think about, "Okay, what's it going to take?" And I will tell you, I've been trying to do this 14 years in Boston. Trying to take dominion in Boston, you know how people say if you make it in New York, you can make it anywhere. If you make it in Boston and take dominion here as a believer, you can do it anywhere. You know real estate prices, and I know how hard it is to be fruitful and multiply and have children. You know what that takes. But the vision is still before us. And then whatever gap we have in our resources, we say, "Holy Spirit, we need you to supernaturally provide." And the Lord does that over and over. One way, if you are single or if you don't have children, if you have a love for children, one way that you can take part in this great commission here at Mosaic is joining mini Mosaic, volunteering at Mini Mosaic. We don't take anyone, by the way, we only take the best. There is a Navy SEAL tryout process. But this is one of the ways that we build up the future generation of believers. And then also we do recognize, statistically, 90% of people who become believers become believers before the age of 18. So we are to build up the kingdom of God and we do that through the great commission without forgetting the great commandment. God gives his people a moral framework to navigate the entire breadth of life, and he does that in the 10 Commandments. Adam was put in the Garden of Eden to work it and guard it. And the word guard means keep evil out. And he failed, and evil entered the world. So God gives his law to his people to show them the ways of life and to guardrail against death. You ever hear of getting Storrowed You know what that is? It's when... Remember the 18-year old who was just given the U-Haul truck keys? It's when that 18 year old follows Google Maps instead of the huge signs right before you enter Storrow, and they're just driving, they hit through the sign, and then they get stuck under a bridge. I view that as that's why God gave us the 10 Commandments. God doesn't want you to get Storrowed. If you break the commandments, the commandments end up breaking you. And yes, in the faith there are moral obligations. The 10 Commandments are still in force. This is how God wants us to frame our lives. Next week we're starting a very new sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We're calling it Kingdom Come. It's going to be a tremendous series. But I write my sermons a week ahead, so next week's sermons already written, it was written on Friday. And last time I preached through Mark was in 2012, and I still got all the word docs. And I went back and I read my sermon from 2012. The introduction was great. It was like what's the best news you ever heard? And I had my classic joke in there. It's a girl, it's a girl, it's a girl and it's a girl, because I have four. But then I got to this point where I wrote this, and I got to confess because it's terrible. I said, "Jesus doesn't teach on morality in the Gospel of Mark. The point of the faith isn't morality, it's not morality, it's just about relationship. It's not religion, it's a relationship." Jesus Christ was Jewish and he was a Jewish Rabbi, he's the son of God who became the son of man. He said, I didn't come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it, to ratify, to show you what the point of the law is. Jesus Christ lived his life perfectly under the 10 commandments, offers his life as a sacrifice for our lawbreaking of the commandments. He gives us grace, saves us and empowers us in the Holy Spirit, to then live a life of obedience of faith according to the commandments. And then Jesus comes and he summarizes. He says, the first four commandments are all about loving God. And the next six are all about loving neighbors. So God defines what it means to love. Deuteronomy five gives us 10 commandments. "And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, hear O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them. The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb, not with our fathers, did the Lord make this covenant but with us, who are all of us here alive today. The Lord spoke with you face-to-face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire. And while I stood between the Lord and you at that time to declare to you the word of the Lord for you were afraid because of the fire and you did not go up into the mountain. He said, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt and out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain, observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath, honor your father and your mother as the Lord your God commanded you that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. And you shall not covet your neighbor's wife. And you shall not desire your neighbor's house, his field or his male servant or his female servant, his ox or his donkey or anything that is your neighbor's." The Sabbath here is a commandment given and is a commandment that transcends time. The Sabbath is a reminder that the purpose of life transcends work. The Sabbath is the only element of the creation that's explicitly marked as holy. The Sabbath belongs to God. Stress and burnout are hazards for driven people and the Sabbath is the best antidote. And God gives us the Sabbath that's still enforced. We do not Sabbath on a Saturday. We Sabbath on a Sunday. Why? Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is... This is one of the great proofs for the resurrection of Christ. What would it take for Jewish people who for thousands of years were taught the Sabbath is on a Saturday, the Sabbath is the seventh day, the Sabbath is on a Saturday. This is the day that you commit to the Lord. And then all of a sudden these same people are now taking the Sabbath on a Sunday. Why? Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. God built it in to the calendar. Religious people added hundreds of manmade rules to the 10 commandments, to the law of God. And they obfuscated the whole point. The whole point was this is how we love God. This is how we love people. And when Jesus came, he reminded us that the whole point of the law is love. Matthew 22:34, "But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law. And he said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets." So what do we do here on Sundays? We gather to worship God. Why do we worship God? Why do we sing to him? Because we love him. Why do we hear from His word? Because we love him and we love what he said. And then we pray together and we celebrate Holy Communion. These are essential practices of the means of grace and the life of a believer. All of our service follow the basic pattern of meeting together that's traced back to the early church. We sing, we pray, we teach from scripture and we respond by taking communion. And our goal isn't to manufacture particular feeling or experience. We want you to meet Jesus Christ. And when you meet Jesus Christ, that changes everything, and that leads to transformation. We're passionate about the person and the work of Jesus Christ. We long to see the message of the gospel, that Jesus Christ lived the life that we were supposed to live in obedience to God's commandments. And then Jesus dies the death that we deserve to die for our lawbreaking, and he goes to the cross, bears the wrath of God, takes the curse upon himself in order to extend mercy and the blessing of obedience to us. Every single one of us, we've broken at least one of the commandments. Not one of us has truly loved God from the heart or neighbor as self. We deserve eternal damnation. We deserve to be banished from the presence of God. But Jesus fulfilled all the commandments from the heart perfectly and then offers himself as a sacrifice to pay the penalty for our sins. When you look to the cross and you see Christ dying on behalf of you, on behalf of your sins, to redeem you, your soul, your body, your heart is filled with love, love for God, and then your heart is filled with love for neighbor. And we do practice loving neighbor as self here, beginning with believers, beginning with Christians. The way that we practice community is in our community groups. We have 20 plus community groups that meet different places, different homes around the week. What do we do in the groups? We open scripture, usually the passages that were associated and read on Sunday. We study the scriptures, we have conversation about the scriptures, and then we pray for one another. We do take membership seriously. At Mosaic membership, we hold in high regard. What's membership? It's a commitment, a mutual commitment. When a church commits to take responsibility for a person and a person commits to take responsibility for the church. And membership is a commitment and a covenant to further the mission, the vision, and the life of the church. How do we become members at Mosaic? The first step is to take a membership class. We will have the dates of the next one advertised soon. If you are new to the faith, perhaps you haven't been baptized as a believer, we practice baptism as believers, because Jesus Christ was baptized as an adult and we follow his example. And what is baptism? It's a public symbol of the spiritual death and resurrection of the believer who's died to their sin and resurrected to new life and Christ. If you have not been baptized as a believer, as an adult, we'd love to have a conversation with you about that. And then if you truly love God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind, you love your neighbor as yourself, what do you want to do? You want to share the gospel with those who don't know the Lord yet. And this is the great commission, Matthew 28, Jesus before his ascension, verse 16, it says, "Now the 11 disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him. But some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age." So we're not only supposed to take dominion over the physical realm, but we're also to take dominion over the spiritual realm as well. And we do that by proclaiming the word of God, proclaiming the gospel, and making disciples of all nations, spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ. Baptism is done in the name, that's singular. And then we're given three names. In the name of the Father and of the Son of the Holy Spirit to show us that there's unity in the Godhead, although there are three different persons. And in this charge where we see that God is community. In the very beginning when God created everything he said, let us make man in our image. The God who is community, the Father, Son, the Holy Spirit and perfect love, creates humanity for community. So God who is community here is telling us, community of believers, to go and welcome new members into the community. I love on the outside of the temple, if you haven't seen it, you can see on the way out, it says "A house of prayer for all nations." I love that. I do pray that Mosaic continues to be a house of prayer for all nations, and for as long as you're here, I pray that you are blessed. And then we are to take the message of the gospel and the kingdom building word wherever we go. And then we are to make disciples. We are to preach the gospel. We are to teach people that there's only one way of salvation. There's only one name by which we are to be saved. And the task of evangelism is so important that Christ gives us the great commission five times, in each of the gospels and in the Book of Acts, Jesus commissions us to go and tell the world the message of salvation. That though we are at war with God, he is giving us pardon, he's giving us amnesty, he's offering us forgiveness. And then we're ushered into the kingdom of Jesus Christ. Jesus calls his followers to give their lives in service of others and to take the gospel to the ends of the earth and make disciples. And whether you've spent your whole life in church or if you're just beginning to investigate the claims of Jesus, there is a place for you here. You're welcome to join, to serve and to expand God's kingdom in Boston, beyond, into the ends of the earth. Mosaic Boston aspires to joyfully become a worldwide kingdom building force by proclaiming, believing and obeying the whole council of God, and thereby building men and women of God committed to the great mission, the great commandment and the great commission. Praise be to God. This time we're going to transition to celebrate holy communion. We do this the first Sunday of every month at Mosaic. For whom is holy communion? It's for followers of Jesus Christ who are living in humble repentance. So first, if you are not a believer in Jesus Christ, we ask that you refrain from this part of the service. Or if you are living in unrepentant sin, we ask that you refrain, instead just think about the gospel and spend some time in repentance. If you would like to partake and have not received the elements, please raise your hand, and one of the ushers will give them to you. And as they do that, I'll pray for our time in communion. Oh holy God, we thank you that though there was a chasm between us and you, that you sent your son Jesus Christ, the perfect lamb of God, the Passover lamb, and Jesus, you were slain, and from your wounds you bled. Your body was crucified, and the word tells us your body was broken. And the greatest pain that you experienced on the cross was not just the physical, excruciating anguish, but the greatest pain you felt was the separation from the loving Father. When you cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Lord, you went through that, you went through that experience of drinking the wrath of God, the whole cup. And you did that for us so that we wouldn't have to. And Lord, right now, as we remember your sufferings, we rejoice that you did that because you love us. You did that because of the joy that was set before you. So we thank you Lord and we pray that you deepen our love for you, even now, expand even our capacity to love you and to love neighbor, and as we meditate upon your suffering on the cross. Lord, we repent of all sin of folly. We repent of insubordination, we repent of building our own kingdoms. And Lord, we receive mercy, we receive grace. And we pray that you continue to fill us with the spirit, continue and empower us to do your will. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen. If you're new, there's two lids. First lid up top, you open up gently, and that opens the cup. And then there's a lid at the bottom. And that's how you receive the bread. "On the night that Jesus Christ was betrayed, he took the bread, and after breaking it, he said, take, eat, and do this in remembrance of me. Then proceeded to take the cup and he said, this cup is the cup of the new covenant of my blood, which is poured out for the sins of many. Take, drink and do this in remembrance of me." Lord Jesus, we thank you for washing our souls with your blood. We thank you Jesus, that by your wounds and the wounds of your body, we can find healing, healing for our souls, healing for our minds, healing for our bodies. Pray Holy Spirit, now send us that healing. Send us your power, send us your anointing. And Lord I pray that you continue to fill our hearts with the fire of your Holy Spirit for the great mission that you have for us. And to all do it with love according to the great commandment, love for you and love for neighbor. And Lord then empower us to your witnesses and to fulfill the great commission by making disciples. Give us opportunities to share the gospel with friends, family, neighbors. And I pray, Lord, in this season, save many people and draw them to yourself, draw the elect, and continue to convert and continue to build up your kingdom. And I pray, Lord, that you give us all grace now as we continue to worship you because you are worthy of all worship. And we pray this in the name of the Father, of the Son of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Mosaic Boston Vision

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 3, 2023 58:57


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Our Heavenly Father, you are a holy God and we marvel at your holiness and we are in awe at your glory. And we stand in amazement that though we rebelled against your reign and your rule, against your dominion over us, you Lord, did not leave us in our ignorance and darkness, but you provided a way for us to be saved. You did it through the life, the death, the burial, and the ascension of your son Jesus Christ. Lord Jesus, we thank you for revealing the fullness of the law of God to us. We thank you that you came, not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it, to ratify it, to show us that the law of God is good, and that we have transgressed it, and we deserve the wrath of God for that transgression. But Lord Jesus, you and your mercy and your love and your kindness went to the cross on our behalf. And today, as we remember your sacrifice on the cross, let us never lose sight of the fact that you were motivated by love toward God and neighbor. This is the epitome of what it means to love, Jesus. Thank you for defining love for us. That love is to lay down your life for those whom you love. And Lord Jesus, we thank you that you taught us the holy scriptures, and you expounded on the holy scriptures, and then you gave us the Holy Spirit, the indwelling power of God who is with us. Holy Spirit, today I pray that you light our hearts on fire for the mission that you have before us. The great mission and the great commandment and the great commission, empower us to fulfill your will here in the city. Give us a vision of what it means to be a city within a city, a humanity within a humanity, a people within a people, a people who submit to you, submit to your word and do everything that we do out of love for God and neighbor. And Lord, continue to use our lives to build up your kingdom. Show us how you have called each one of us individually to build according to the blueprints that you have given us. Lord, bless our service and bless the sermon, and we pray this in Christ's holy name. Amen. Today is our annual Mosaic Boston vision sermon. And every Sunday we meet here at this wonderful temple, Temple Ohabei Shalom. I always know who's new because they come in and they're mesmerized by the building. They haven't learned to see the flaws in the building as I have. I look at the roof and I'm like, "Oh, please don't collapse on us." Or the seats, that they're not the most comfortable. But it's a wonderful building. And temple Temple Ohabei Shalom means, the temple of the lovers of peace. And every Sunday we here open up Yahweh's holy word, God's holy word, which outlines the plan of God's peace, the plan of God's true shalom, which is universal flourishing. On our branding, we put our values which are love Jesus simple. Love, why? Because that's the point of the whole thing. God is love. And then God, out of love, gives his son, Jesus, motivated by love, lays down his life on our behalf, and God extends that love to us in forgiveness and by grace through faith in Christ. And then Jesus Christ is the word of God. He's the one that reveals God's word to us, confirms God's word. He shows us that everything that preceded him was true. And he does that by coming back from the dead. And what Jesus does is he shows us though God is love, love is not God. Jesus defines what it means to love God, what it means to love neighbor as self. And then by simple we mean that the Holy Spirit loves to simplify. Truth is simple. Satan loves to obfuscate. Satan loves to add rules upon rules, human tradition, manmade rules, and people lose sight of what it means to love God. And by simplicity, we have a very simple method of ministry here at Mosaic, we do what the early church did, we gather for worship publicly in the temple and then we meet in small groups around the city during the week. And that's how we practice community. And then service, we volunteer here and we volunteer our time, and we do want to see the next generation of believers built up. We volunteer at Mini Mosaic. A little more later on that. We are recruiting more volunteers for Mini Mosaic, which is a crucial ministry. But what is our vision? Where are we going? And by vision, I do not mean I foresee the future. By vision, I mean I believe that the Lord has impressed on my heart and mind blueprints for how we are to operate, how we are to build this church, how we are to build the kingdom. And this is how often God works. Moses goes up on the mountain and he is given the blueprint for the law of God, the 10 Commandments, the moral law. Moses goes up on the mountain again and he's given the architectural plans, the blueprints for the tabernacle. How are we to build the tabernacle? David, in the same way, receives from the Lord, the blueprints for how are we going to build the temple of God. Ezekiel gets a vision of the temple in the city, of the land and he gets blueprints. And then God's spirit comes upon God's people and God says, "I've given you opportunities, talents, I have given you skills, I have given you resources." And then the Holy Spirit helps you find your place in how you then practically build the kingdom of God. Our vision, and I'll unpack every word, "Mosaic Boston aspires to joyfully become a worldwide kingdom building force by proclaiming, believing and obeying the whole council of God, and thereby building men and women of God committed to the great mission, the great commandment and the great commission." So first of all, we aspire to do everything we do joyfully. Psalm 100 verse one and two, "Make a joyful noise to the Lord all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come into his presence with singing." Philippians 4:4, "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice." There's this one episode in holy scripture where God gives the power of the Holy Spirit, to the disciples and they go and they're doing miracles, and they started casting out demons in the name of Jesus Christ because the name of Jesus is above every other name. And then they come back to Jesus and they're like, "Jesus, even the demons obey us." You know what Jesus says? "Rejoice not that the demons obey you, rejoice that your names are written in heaven." So everything we do, we do as propelled out of the outflow of our joy, in that we get to be the children of God. We were adopted into the family of God and he's given us a wonderful mission. We aspire joyfully to become a worldwide kingdom building force. One of the reasons that God puts Israel, the people of God, in the Promised Land initially was because of the geographic location. In many profound ways, Israel, the promised land stood at the crossroads of the whole world. Israel stood at the crossroads of continents and of historic empires. Israel is right in the middle, connecting Africa, Asia, and to a certain degree, even Europe. It's a land bridge and that's why it's called the cradle of civilization. And some of the most important trade routes in the world went straight through Israel. And why did God place them there? God placed them there because he wanted them to stand at the crossroads, to shape and influence the cultural forces of the day, and witness to God, witness to Yahweh, witness to the fact that there is only one God and he has created everything and he has given us a law, and we have transgressed that law, and we deserve the penalty for breaking the law of God is death. So we need redemption. Isaiah 43:10, "You are my witnesses, declares the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen that you may know and believe me and understand that I am He. Before me know God was formed." Exodus 19, five through six, "Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine. And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." So Israel was commissioned by God to testify to the world about who God is and then minister to the world as priests proclaiming the excellencies of God. Jesus echoes the same words to the disciples after his resurrection, Acts 1:8 "But you'll receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth." St. Peter in First Peter 2:9 says, "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." In Revelation one, four through six, John, to the seven churches that are in Asia, "Grace to you in peace from him who is and who was and who is to come. And from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom priest to his God and father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever." Amen. And God still wants his children to be his witnesses, to be a kingdom of priests, proclaiming the truths of God's word. And he wants to call us, and he's calling us to stand at the crossroads of life. And Boston, in many ways, is the crossroads of the world. People from all over the world come here for education, career, success, money, opportunities. This week, end of August, beginning of September, this week before Labor Day, I always play the same game every year. I try to count the moving trucks. How many moving trucks can I count? This week, I'm telling you, I don't know what happened, a hundred plus. I stopped counting after a hundred. And the moving trucks, they're all here. And if you know anything about U-Haul, they give keys to anybody. You got a heartbeat, you got a license, 18 years old, just graduated high school, here's keys to a truck. And then they show up in Boston. They don't know how to drive here. People have lived here for 10 years, don't know how to drive here. You got to know the ins and outs. You've got to be a master driver to make it here. And so it's chaos, but we are to extend grace. But what I'm saying is, is there a more strategic place in the world to plant your life and to commit to serve as a witness to King Jesus? Jesus is Lord, this is what we're... Jesus told the disciples early on, "Go and make disciples of all nations." We live in a place where the nations come to us. And over the years I've got so many stories, but one just came to mind recently. A few weeks ago we had this couple that was with us for a couple weeks and they were just visiting. And what they said was, "We were part of this church seven years ago and God so blessed us seven years ago that we've been following the ministry," and they felt called by God to go to Sydney, Australia and they're part of a church planning team. And they said, "We have a confession to make all the resources you put online, we just steal it. We just take it." And I was like, "Good, it's not mine. It belongs to the kingdom. Use it for kingdom purposes." Incredible influence worldwide just by preaching the gospel here. And what are we preaching? We're preaching that Jesus is king. Jesus is king above all kings. He's Lord above all lords. And there are only two kingdoms. There's God and his kingdom, there's Satan in his kingdom. There's no neutral territory. It's either you're with Christ and you're in the kingdom of God or you're against Christ and you're in the kingdom of Satan. And what we preach is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Anybody who believes, anybody who receives the grace of God, anyone who repents of sin and submits to Christ, you're transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of his beloved son. That's Colossians one, 13 and 14. "He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." And once you're in his kingdom, we work the rest of our lives to submit everything in our lives and in our spheres of influence to King Jesus. At every single one of our membership classes, we use the metaphor of cruise ship verse battleship to explain how we view the church. A lot of places where the church has been around for a long time and they're resourced, what happens is you can professionalize every single part of the ministry and you cater to everyone's needs, and you go to the church, it's like a show. You have a good time and then you're gone. It's like on a cruise ship. Why do people go on a cruise? To rest and to be entertained, to eat tremendously, to have a good time. Well, church is not like a cruise ship. We're not here to entertain you. We're here to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and the full counsel of God. And God has given us a mission. And on a battleship, what unites the people? What unites the people is the mission. Why are we here? What's our purpose? And the Lord Jesus Christ tells us we have an enemy. And if you're new to the city, welcome to spiritual war. There is a battle for the souls. And I feel this every end of August, beginning of September. I feel it. I see it. There's prophetic dreams. It's people from all over the world. Powerful souls are brought here, and now there's a battle for their souls. Which kingdom are you going to serve? Which king are you going to follow? But recently I've realized we're not just a battleship. In my church office, I have a beautiful painting. It's a sunset in the back, it's gorgeous. And then this is just a massive aircraft carrier, rusted, beat up from battles, but it's going, it's steadfastly, steadily moving, powerfully moving forward. And then planes land on the aircraft carrier and that they descend and ascend. That's how I view ministry in Boston. People from all over the world. It's like their plane lands in our aircraft carrier and then the mechanics go to work. They see what's wrong with the engine, they fix things up, they fuel you up, give you new directions and new inspiration, passion, desire to continue serving the Lord. In a similar way to the people of Israel worshiping in a beautiful temple in Jerusalem at the crossroads of their world, we find ourselves worshiping God the same God at the crossroads of the world here. So we see the strategic importance of a church proclaiming the gospel of God, the full counsel of God here. By making an impact here, we truly are making an impact worldwide. Now, how do we do that? How do we want to make an impact for the kingdom of God, a worldwide impact? How? By the word of God. Proclaiming, believing and obeying the whole council of God. In Acts 20, St. Paul, after spending some time with believers in Ephesus, he's leaving them, and then he says the following to them, "Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God." What an interesting way of phrasing his ministry, explaining his ministry. Had he not taught them the whole council of God, there would have been some kind of responsibility on him. He would have been guilty of their blood. And he says, "I didn't shrink." Why with that language? Because there is sometimes a temptation to back off from doctrines that make people squirm. We approach preaching the word of God as we do with the goal of proclaiming the whole council of God. From Genesis to Revelation, this is the inerrant, infallible, authoritative word of God. This is the foundation of everything that we do. Do you not think I know which doctrines make people squirm? Oh, I know. I've done this long enough. I can tell by body language, uncomfortable, uncomfortable. Sometimes people make it very obvious they get up and they're flip me the bird on the way out. You guys don't see that. I see that. My life would be much easier if I did not touch the difficult doctrines. But to remain faithful to God and to remain innocent of the blood of all, I can't but stand on the word of God. This is what we do at the church, we stand on the word of God. Why? Because we want to deepen in you, not just your faith, but your obedience. And that's what true faith always leads to, obedience to the Lord. And we saw this with Romans, the bookends and Romans one and Romans 16, the phrase obedience of faith. Romans 1:5, "Through whom we have received grace in apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations." And then Romans 16:26, "But has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings, has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith." And by proclaiming, obeying and believing the word of God and the whole council, we thereby aspire to build men and women of God committed particular three things, the great mission, the great commandment and the great commission. And I start with the great mission. It's usually known as the cultural mandate. The word culture isn't in it and the word mandate isn't in there either. And I actually think that this title diminishes the weight of the charge. God creates Adam and Eve, he creates humanity. And then the first imperative that he gives them, the first charge, the first mission, is found in Genesis 1:26 through 28. And because it's the very first imperative, it carries primacy. The creation mandate as some have called it, is rather a dominion mandate. It's a mission to take dominion, commanding human beings to bring every sphere of society, as well as nature itself, into subjugation to Jesus Christ. So this is Genesis 1:26 through 28, what I call the great mission. "And then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female, he created them, and God blessed them, God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth." There are three questions of supreme importance to every single person. One, who is God? Second, who am I? And third, what does God require of us? And holy scripture here answers these three questions in the very opening chapter, and how you answer these questions impacts the trajectory of your life and eternity. We learn in the opening chapter of holy scriptures that God is, he is the supreme creator of all things seen and unseen, including humanity. And we also learn that man is unique in all of God's creation being made in the image of God. And therefore God has given us a unique responsibility of doing what? Taking dominion, exercising dominion over the world that God has made. And that's why twice it's repeated. This is why I've created you, to take dominion. This is the blessing, take dominion. God creates man in his image and after his likeness so that man would fill the earth with his offspring, continue to image forth more of God and exercise dominion over the created order. God has ultimate authority and he's given us delegated authority. His authority is absolute, ours is derived from God. He says, let us make man in our image after our likeness. There's a divine counsel. God uses the plural here, let us make. The divine counsel precedes the creation. And it's striking that it's plural, and the interpretation is from the whole council of God that this is the Holy Trinity. It's not a full revelation of the Trinity, but the doctrine of the Trinity makes sense of this text best. And man is to image God in at least three ways. First of all, God made us rational creatures. We can think, we can reason. We are to understand truth. We are to pursue truth. We are to develop our powers of discernment. God has also made us moral beings, that God has written His law upon our hearts. We know when we sin, we know when we have transgressed the law of God. And then God has also given us the charge of dominion. He's given us a royal office to bring everything in subjugation to him. Let them have dominion, in the Hebrew it's [foreign language] to master, to reign, to prevail against, to rule, to create order where there's chaos. And it begins with what? It begins with taking dominion of yourself. You are responsible for you. That you are responsible to submit yourself to the Lord. And when you do, he fills you with the power of God to continue taking dominion. He says, let them start with the fish, the birds and the livestock over all the earth. God made life to feed us. He made plants to eat in Genesis 1:29, and animals are given to as food after the flood in Genesis nine. And he does want us to take good care of the animals under our charge. God is a loving God. He even cares about animals. Proverbs 12:10, "Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, but the mercy of the wicked is cruel." I don't have any beasts at my house, but I have fish. I have five fish, and it is a godly thing to feed your little beast. They get really excited. I feed them. My youngest daughter is four. She's like, "Dad, don't feed them. I want that to be my job." She likes to... We are to master. We are to subdue. We are to care for what God has entrusted to us, and we are to develop its latent potential. And every type of being is to be subservient to humanity. Humans are not on the same level with dogs. We're not on the same level with animals. We are higher. We're not on the same level as the earth itself. We are beings that tower high above all other creatures. We are to be their king and their crown. We are kings of creation under God, and we have a delegated authority for restoring created and creation order, to rule with benevolence, not like a despot out for his own gain. Fill the earth, subdue, rule over it. It's stewardship. Dominion doesn't mean destruction, it means responsibility. And also it means to create. Genesis 1:27, look, three times the verb create is used. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God He created him, male and female, he created them." It's significant that God, for the very first time we find out that God is a creator. He creates, and he creates us in his own image and we are to be agents of creation and recreation. Man was created to image God, and image God by exercising true dominion under God's authority, for God's glory. We are to promote the worship of God. The service of God is to be maintained. And we are to develop and improve the creation around us. Improvement and development takes place when we're empowered by the king of kings. And then once we do take dominion, we submit everything to the feet of Christ. In order to subdue the earth, we must first understand its processes. This is why research is foundational for fulfilling the divine mandate. And then once we get that knowledge, we must apply in technology and engineering and medicine and agriculture, must be implemented for use, and business and commerce transmitted to future generations via education. The creation can also be described and praised in the humanities and fine arts. We are to further the good, the true and the beautiful. The dominion mandate thus authorizes all honorable human occupations as stewardship under God. So we must learn how the world operates, which requires expertise and knowledge and engineering and mathematics, physics, aerodynamics and agriculture. And then we teach our offspring to be involved in these areas as well. The tragedy is that leadership in practically all of these fields in our city and in our world has largely been taken over by secularists and humanists. People that don't honor God, they're not taking dominion for God, they're taking dominion for the enemy. So God's primeval commission here, the great mission has been, in many ways subverted. And Christians today need a new renewed vision and commitment, not only to Christ second coming, yes, he's coming. He's going to fix everything. And not just to the great commission. Yes, that's important. But once people are disciples of Christ, we are to teach them to obey everything that he taught us from the very beginning. So we need a renewed vision of the great mission of responsible world stewardship. So whatever your chosen field, you should aspire to be the very best. The mindset is whatever your job, whatever your field, I'm not just here to take part, I'm here to take over. I'm here to take dominion of whatever God has called me to. In Colossians 3:17, "Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God, the Father, through him." First Peter 4:10 and 11, "As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies, in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen." So as we study creation, as we use our talents in creation to subdue it under the feet of Christ, we become agents of this common grace. We are to make the world a better place by using our skills and talents to build things that are beautiful and useful, while countering the forces of evil and sin that oppress and distort creation. We live in a fallen cursed world, and it's only by the power of the Holy Spirit can we seek to reverse the effects of the curse. And Genesis 1:28, at the heart of the great mission, "and God blessed them and God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the heavens, over every living thing that moves on the earth." The primary purpose of marriage is given here in Malachi 2:15, it's reiterated, "Did he not make them one with a portion of the spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. So guard yourselves in your spirit and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth." If God's will is godly children, then of course it makes sense that Satan would do everything in his powers to prevent this, from sexual perversion to gender confusion, to abortion to divorce. And men and women of God must carry this work out. We must work together and have children who are then trained in a godly Christian fashion to carry out the dominion mandate. Overpopulation is not a concern for God, nor should it be a concern for us. The very idea of depopulation is demonic because Satan came to steal, kill and destroy. The words, fill the earth, incidentally suggest that fears of population explosion are much overdrawn. Evidently the world is well able to support a large population. And Satan's always behind depopulation. Why? Because Satan's not omnipresent. Satan can only be in one place at one time. He's not God. And the demonic, well that's numbered, they're numbered. And the more godly people there are, the more the demonic forces are outnumbered. It's the same power, the strategy over and over. Remember in Egypt when Israel was in the captivity, they were enslaved by Pharaoh. Now Pharaoh realized that they were multiplying so much more than the people of Egypt. What does he do? Force depopulation. We're going to kill the children of Israel. And Moses was saved by his mom. This mandate to be fruitful and multiply, this mission, is so important God repeats it twice after the great flood in Genesis nine. And how are we to go about this whole process of subduing and taking dominion and being fruitful and multiplying? It's all to be done with love, never harshly, but always tenderly, carefully and faithfully. The nature of man's dominion, if he is to be Lord of all, he must be servant of all. This was true in the garden before the fall as it is today. Remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ concerning the exercise of authority in Matthew 20:25, "But Jesus called them to him and said, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave. Even as the son of man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom." For many godly authority is true authority, but it's not based on force or coercion or manipulation. And to understand dominion, we can look at Ephesians five and draw analogies there. That dominion is not exploitive, it's not oppressive, it's always loving. Christ in the church, for example. Christ is the head of the church and Christ's headship of the church leads the church to thrive, to be fruitful, to become evermore lovely. Or the relationship between husband and wife, also Ephesians five. Under her husband's righteous headship, a wife is to thrive and be fruitful and become evermore lovely. And we've been given dominion over creation. If we exercise godly dominion over creation, under the lordship of Christ, creation will thrive and be fruitful and become evermore lovely. Knowledge and appreciation of our fellow creatures is essential. And it's all to be done in love. Romans 5:17, "For if because of one man's trespass, death reigned through the one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ." Romans right there, he says, if you've given grace, God gives you grace to save you. You're in the kingdom of God now, and now we are to expand God's kingdom by taking dominion. We are to reign in life. And it's a mindset shift. If you think about everything you are and everything you have, where in your life is there chaos? And where in your life do you need to take dominion, that you need to take responsibility? You know those days where you do not want to work out, it's the last thing... Instead of working out, you just want a large cheese pizza. And at those moments you got to remind yourself... Once in a while you got to take a break. But as a pattern rhythm of life, we have to take dominion of our bodies. I will tell my body what to do. Take dominion of your health. Take dominion of your mind, as much as you can, take dominion of your soul. Now I started thinking about just even house chores like this. I see trash and I'm like, "Ah, got to take dominion. That's my job, those dishes to do. I'm taking dominion of these dishes." But if you start thinking like that, I'm like, "Huh, all right, where in my life is life out of control? Where do I need dominion? Holy Spirit, give me strength." So take good care of what God has given you. Take good care of your possessions, of your finances. Take good care of your relationships and desire greater influence. Desire greater dominion. Seek to expand your domain of dominion. First Chronicles 4:10, there's a gentleman named Jabez and he prayed the following, "Jabez called upon the God of Israel saying, oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my border and that your hand might be with me and that you would keep me from harm so that it might not bring me pain. And God granted what he asked." Do you ask God, "Lord enlarge my borders, Lord, give me more influence. Give me more of a domain to take dominion of?" Adam was given the charge to do this, the great mission, but he was given the charge of the perfect world. Therefore, his job was a gardener in the perfect world where everything was perfect. He didn't need a house in the garden of Eden, they lived outside. They didn't need air conditioning. Everything... The temperature was perfect. For Adam, it was 67. For Eve, it was around 73. God kept everyone... But everything was perfect. And God gave Adam a job. In Genesis 2:15, the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it, work it and guard it." So Adam's task was given to him before the fall. Before the curse, there were no weeds. He didn't have to toil by the sweat of his brow. Pregnancy or childbirth did not come with pains. Yeah they lived in a different world. There was no need to build shelter to survive in a harsh environment. And Adam did not do his job even in the perfect environment. He did not take dominion. He abdicated his responsibility. When Satan came and tempted Eve and him, he did not fight Satan, and therefore dominion of the world of the created order moved from Adam to Satan. That's why Jesus, when he came, three times in John 12, John 14, John 16, calls Satan the ruler of this world. This was supposed to be man's role, but Adam's willful sin led to him forfeiting the dominion. And then Jesus Christ comes and he comes to destroy the works of the evil one. And I find it fascinating, how did Jesus take dominion up until age 30? Jesus started his ministry at age 30. That's when he started teaching the word of God, telling everyone the kingdom's at hand, repentant and believe. But Jesus Christ, in crucial years of his youth, what did he do as vocation? He was a carpenter. He was a builder. Adam lived in a perfect world. He didn't have to build houses. Everything was perfect. Jesus Christ comes in the fallen world. How is he taking dominion? He is building. He's building structures in the real world to house real families. And that was part of God's blueprint. How do you expand the kingdom of God? By building, in order to house, to house families and house people and house the church. So now we are tasked with the same work, take dominion, in a fallen world, and we take it from Satan, we take ground for Jesus Christ. And real estate is part of it. We, as a church, we do have a vision of taking dominion... Yes, I want to take Boston. This is the reason why I moved here in 2009. My pitch to everybody was, we are taking Boston and we're going to proclaim the gospel of God until we fill Fenway Park with converts. Everyone in Fenway Park is going to get saved. Everybody. That's the vision. We want to take this city. But part of taking the city is taking dominion, getting rooted, getting real estate. And just one example of where I see this in scripture, Jeremiah 29, God sends the prophet Jeremiah as a prophet to proclaim to the people of God in captivity. They were taken from the promised land to Babylon. And he says, this is God's plan for how you are going to build the kingdom in Babylon. Everyone knows Jeremiah 29:11, it's on every Christian mug that you find. "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare, not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." But the plans are actually outlined in the same chapter. That's why I'm like, you can't just pick and choose verse. He gives us the plan. He gives us the plan in verse four and seven, Jeremiah 29:4, "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, build houses and live in them, plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters and take wives through your sons and give your daughters in marriage that you may bear sons and daughters. Multiply there and do not decrease, but seek the welfare of the city where I've sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf for in its welfare you will find your welfare." So we do pray for the Lord to give you a vision, to be rooted here, to think about, "Okay, what's it going to take?" And I will tell you, I've been trying to do this 14 years in Boston. Trying to take dominion in Boston, you know how people say if you make it in New York, you can make it anywhere. If you make it in Boston and take dominion here as a believer, you can do it anywhere. You know real estate prices, and I know how hard it is to be fruitful and multiply and have children. You know what that takes. But the vision is still before us. And then whatever gap we have in our resources, we say, "Holy Spirit, we need you to supernaturally provide." And the Lord does that over and over. One way, if you are single or if you don't have children, if you have a love for children, one way that you can take part in this great commission here at Mosaic is joining mini Mosaic, volunteering at Mini Mosaic. We don't take anyone, by the way, we only take the best. There is a Navy SEAL tryout process. But this is one of the ways that we build up the future generation of believers. And then also we do recognize, statistically, 90% of people who become believers become believers before the age of 18. So we are to build up the kingdom of God and we do that through the great commission without forgetting the great commandment. God gives his people a moral framework to navigate the entire breadth of life, and he does that in the 10 Commandments. Adam was put in the Garden of Eden to work it and guard it. And the word guard means keep evil out. And he failed, and evil entered the world. So God gives his law to his people to show them the ways of life and to guardrail against death. You ever hear of getting Storrowed You know what that is? It's when... Remember the 18-year old who was just given the U-Haul truck keys? It's when that 18 year old follows Google Maps instead of the huge signs right before you enter Storrow, and they're just driving, they hit through the sign, and then they get stuck under a bridge. I view that as that's why God gave us the 10 Commandments. God doesn't want you to get Storrowed. If you break the commandments, the commandments end up breaking you. And yes, in the faith there are moral obligations. The 10 Commandments are still in force. This is how God wants us to frame our lives. Next week we're starting a very new sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We're calling it Kingdom Come. It's going to be a tremendous series. But I write my sermons a week ahead, so next week's sermons already written, it was written on Friday. And last time I preached through Mark was in 2012, and I still got all the word docs. And I went back and I read my sermon from 2012. The introduction was great. It was like what's the best news you ever heard? And I had my classic joke in there. It's a girl, it's a girl, it's a girl and it's a girl, because I have four. But then I got to this point where I wrote this, and I got to confess because it's terrible. I said, "Jesus doesn't teach on morality in the Gospel of Mark. The point of the faith isn't morality, it's not morality, it's just about relationship. It's not religion, it's a relationship." Jesus Christ was Jewish and he was a Jewish Rabbi, he's the son of God who became the son of man. He said, I didn't come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it, to ratify, to show you what the point of the law is. Jesus Christ lived his life perfectly under the 10 commandments, offers his life as a sacrifice for our lawbreaking of the commandments. He gives us grace, saves us and empowers us in the Holy Spirit, to then live a life of obedience of faith according to the commandments. And then Jesus comes and he summarizes. He says, the first four commandments are all about loving God. And the next six are all about loving neighbors. So God defines what it means to love. Deuteronomy five gives us 10 commandments. "And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, hear O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them. The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb, not with our fathers, did the Lord make this covenant but with us, who are all of us here alive today. The Lord spoke with you face-to-face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire. And while I stood between the Lord and you at that time to declare to you the word of the Lord for you were afraid because of the fire and you did not go up into the mountain. He said, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt and out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain, observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath, honor your father and your mother as the Lord your God commanded you that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. And you shall not covet your neighbor's wife. And you shall not desire your neighbor's house, his field or his male servant or his female servant, his ox or his donkey or anything that is your neighbor's." The Sabbath here is a commandment given and is a commandment that transcends time. The Sabbath is a reminder that the purpose of life transcends work. The Sabbath is the only element of the creation that's explicitly marked as holy. The Sabbath belongs to God. Stress and burnout are hazards for driven people and the Sabbath is the best antidote. And God gives us the Sabbath that's still enforced. We do not Sabbath on a Saturday. We Sabbath on a Sunday. Why? Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is... This is one of the great proofs for the resurrection of Christ. What would it take for Jewish people who for thousands of years were taught the Sabbath is on a Saturday, the Sabbath is the seventh day, the Sabbath is on a Saturday. This is the day that you commit to the Lord. And then all of a sudden these same people are now taking the Sabbath on a Sunday. Why? Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. God built it in to the calendar. Religious people added hundreds of manmade rules to the 10 commandments, to the law of God. And they obfuscated the whole point. The whole point was this is how we love God. This is how we love people. And when Jesus came, he reminded us that the whole point of the law is love. Matthew 22:34, "But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law. And he said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets." So what do we do here on Sundays? We gather to worship God. Why do we worship God? Why do we sing to him? Because we love him. Why do we hear from His word? Because we love him and we love what he said. And then we pray together and we celebrate Holy Communion. These are essential practices of the means of grace and the life of a believer. All of our service follow the basic pattern of meeting together that's traced back to the early church. We sing, we pray, we teach from scripture and we respond by taking communion. And our goal isn't to manufacture particular feeling or experience. We want you to meet Jesus Christ. And when you meet Jesus Christ, that changes everything, and that leads to transformation. We're passionate about the person and the work of Jesus Christ. We long to see the message of the gospel, that Jesus Christ lived the life that we were supposed to live in obedience to God's commandments. And then Jesus dies the death that we deserve to die for our lawbreaking, and he goes to the cross, bears the wrath of God, takes the curse upon himself in order to extend mercy and the blessing of obedience to us. Every single one of us, we've broken at least one of the commandments. Not one of us has truly loved God from the heart or neighbor as self. We deserve eternal damnation. We deserve to be banished from the presence of God. But Jesus fulfilled all the commandments from the heart perfectly and then offers himself as a sacrifice to pay the penalty for our sins. When you look to the cross and you see Christ dying on behalf of you, on behalf of your sins, to redeem you, your soul, your body, your heart is filled with love, love for God, and then your heart is filled with love for neighbor. And we do practice loving neighbor as self here, beginning with believers, beginning with Christians. The way that we practice community is in our community groups. We have 20 plus community groups that meet different places, different homes around the week. What do we do in the groups? We open scripture, usually the passages that were associated and read on Sunday. We study the scriptures, we have conversation about the scriptures, and then we pray for one another. We do take membership seriously. At Mosaic membership, we hold in high regard. What's membership? It's a commitment, a mutual commitment. When a church commits to take responsibility for a person and a person commits to take responsibility for the church. And membership is a commitment and a covenant to further the mission, the vision, and the life of the church. How do we become members at Mosaic? The first step is to take a membership class. We will have the dates of the next one advertised soon. If you are new to the faith, perhaps you haven't been baptized as a believer, we practice baptism as believers, because Jesus Christ was baptized as an adult and we follow his example. And what is baptism? It's a public symbol of the spiritual death and resurrection of the believer who's died to their sin and resurrected to new life and Christ. If you have not been baptized as a believer, as an adult, we'd love to have a conversation with you about that. And then if you truly love God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind, you love your neighbor as yourself, what do you want to do? You want to share the gospel with those who don't know the Lord yet. And this is the great commission, Matthew 28, Jesus before his ascension, verse 16, it says, "Now the 11 disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him. But some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age." So we're not only supposed to take dominion over the physical realm, but we're also to take dominion over the spiritual realm as well. And we do that by proclaiming the word of God, proclaiming the gospel, and making disciples of all nations, spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ. Baptism is done in the name, that's singular. And then we're given three names. In the name of the Father and of the Son of the Holy Spirit to show us that there's unity in the Godhead, although there are three different persons. And in this charge where we see that God is community. In the very beginning when God created everything he said, let us make man in our image. The God who is community, the Father, Son, the Holy Spirit and perfect love, creates humanity for community. So God who is community here is telling us, community of believers, to go and welcome new members into the community. I love on the outside of the temple, if you haven't seen it, you can see on the way out, it says "A house of prayer for all nations." I love that. I do pray that Mosaic continues to be a house of prayer for all nations, and for as long as you're here, I pray that you are blessed. And then we are to take the message of the gospel and the kingdom building word wherever we go. And then we are to make disciples. We are to preach the gospel. We are to teach people that there's only one way of salvation. There's only one name by which we are to be saved. And the task of evangelism is so important that Christ gives us the great commission five times, in each of the gospels and in the Book of Acts, Jesus commissions us to go and tell the world the message of salvation. That though we are at war with God, he is giving us pardon, he's giving us amnesty, he's offering us forgiveness. And then we're ushered into the kingdom of Jesus Christ. Jesus calls his followers to give their lives in service of others and to take the gospel to the ends of the earth and make disciples. And whether you've spent your whole life in church or if you're just beginning to investigate the claims of Jesus, there is a place for you here. You're welcome to join, to serve and to expand God's kingdom in Boston, beyond, into the ends of the earth. Mosaic Boston aspires to joyfully become a worldwide kingdom building force by proclaiming, believing and obeying the whole council of God, and thereby building men and women of God committed to the great mission, the great commandment and the great commission. Praise be to God. This time we're going to transition to celebrate holy communion. We do this the first Sunday of every month at Mosaic. For whom is holy communion? It's for followers of Jesus Christ who are living in humble repentance. So first, if you are not a believer in Jesus Christ, we ask that you refrain from this part of the service. Or if you are living in unrepentant sin, we ask that you refrain, instead just think about the gospel and spend some time in repentance. If you would like to partake and have not received the elements, please raise your hand, and one of the ushers will give them to you. And as they do that, I'll pray for our time in communion. Oh holy God, we thank you that though there was a chasm between us and you, that you sent your son Jesus Christ, the perfect lamb of God, the Passover lamb, and Jesus, you were slain, and from your wounds you bled. Your body was crucified, and the word tells us your body was broken. And the greatest pain that you experienced on the cross was not just the physical, excruciating anguish, but the greatest pain you felt was the separation from the loving Father. When you cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Lord, you went through that, you went through that experience of drinking the wrath of God, the whole cup. And you did that for us so that we wouldn't have to. And Lord, right now, as we remember your sufferings, we rejoice that you did that because you love us. You did that because of the joy that was set before you. So we thank you Lord and we pray that you deepen our love for you, even now, expand even our capacity to love you and to love neighbor, and as we meditate upon your suffering on the cross. Lord, we repent of all sin of folly. We repent of insubordination, we repent of building our own kingdoms. And Lord, we receive mercy, we receive grace. And we pray that you continue to fill us with the spirit, continue and empower us to do your will. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen. If you're new, there's two lids. First lid up top, you open up gently, and that opens the cup. And then there's a lid at the bottom. And that's how you receive the bread. "On the night that Jesus Christ was betrayed, he took the bread, and after breaking it, he said, take, eat, and do this in remembrance of me. Then proceeded to take the cup and he said, this cup is the cup of the new covenant of my blood, which is poured out for the sins of many. Take, drink and do this in remembrance of me." Lord Jesus, we thank you for washing our souls with your blood. We thank you Jesus, that by your wounds and the wounds of your body, we can find healing, healing for our souls, healing for our minds, healing for our bodies. Pray Holy Spirit, now send us that healing. Send us your power, send us your anointing. And Lord I pray that you continue to fill our hearts with the fire of your Holy Spirit for the great mission that you have for us. And to all do it with love according to the great commandment, love for you and love for neighbor. And Lord then empower us to your witnesses and to fulfill the great commission by making disciples. Give us opportunities to share the gospel with friends, family, neighbors. And I pray, Lord, in this season, save many people and draw them to yourself, draw the elect, and continue to convert and continue to build up your kingdom. And I pray, Lord, that you give us all grace now as we continue to worship you because you are worthy of all worship. And we pray this in the name of the Father, of the Son of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Blessings of Christian Community

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 27, 2023 58:03


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Welcome. We're thrilled to have you here. We're always praying for the Lord to send us just people asking questions about Christianity, questions about Jesus, how to be saved, and we're always praying for the Lord to send us people who already have vibrant, loving relationships with the Lord and are here to work. And this is an exciting time here to serve the Lord with us, join mission with us. And this is an exciting time of year where we always have a lot of fresh faces coming in at the end of summer, beginning of the year program, academic year and after a lot of people have left. So we're thrilled you're here. If you are new and you want to get plugged in, I hope you just talk to people next to you, but a formal way to do that is to fill out the connection card and take it to the welcome center or put it in the offering bin there at the back of the center aisle, and we'll get you plugged in. And if you are new, again I said, I'm Andy. I was out for the past four weeks. The church blessed me with a long three-week vacation after a busy year, and I'll elaborate a lot on that. And today is an exciting time of year for us. We just ended a long series in the Book of Genesis, going through Genesis 37 through 50, talking about the life of a great saint Joseph and how his life pointed us to Jesus Christ in many ways, even in the first book of the Bible and how he pointed us ultimately to Christ and his sacrifice and the forgiveness he offers us. But today we're done with Genesis and we are taking up an identity series. We talk about our identity, we talk about our values every time this time of August, every September, and we're really trying to bring unity of identity, unity of purpose and vision to the body, and so I'll take us up. My hope today is really to prime your hearts, prepare your hearts as we reflect on the past year together today in order to prepare our hearts to get going and flying in support of the slightly tweaked vision going forward. So today I want to begin by reading the main passage of the day, and that is Ephesians 2:11-22, Ephesians 2:11-22. And this is the living word of God. Ephesians 2:11-22, "Therefore, remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands." "Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ, for he himself is our peace who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God and one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near." "For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In Him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit." This is the word of our Lord. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you that it is living. We thank you that it is authoritative. We thank you that it is powerful. Lord, we thank you for the reminder that we see in it today that who we are is rooted in the work of Jesus Christ and his life, death and sacrifice in the cross. And Lord, we praise you that we can have an identity that is gifted to us by you. We do not have to work our way towards you, but in Jesus we can have peace simply by believing in his works. And Lord, right now, we pray as we work out our own identity, seek to understand it better, let it inform the way that we approach brother and sister, especially here in the church here at Mosaic. Lord, we seek to be a more faithful body. We seek to show the world who you are, show the blessedness that comes with faith in the gospel by loving one another better this year. Lord, we ask that your spirit would just refine our view, our understanding of church, our understanding of relating to brother and sister and, of course, our understanding of our relationship to you and Jesus today. Bless the preaching of your word. In Jesus name I pray. Amen. So happy New Year. To contribute to my introduction, I want you to look at the person next to you and say, happy New Year. And wow, some of you actually did that. I would've been the kind of person to just sit there. Thank you for your vulnerability and following my instruction. So why do I begin the day, this series, this little moment in the year where we reflect on who we are as a church with happy New Year? Why first? There's three reasons. First, because it actually is the real new year in Boston coming up this week. We have Labor Day weekend next week, and everybody who's been in Boston for a while and really the northeastern United States and America knows that this is really the start of the real new year, and this is New Year's Eve. We're at the point where we are looking back in preparation to looking ahead to the new year before we get running. And I say this just as a little reminder to all of you, get ready for it. Next week, life speeds up. And if you haven't prepared your body, haven't prepared your heart before it takes off, you've got to be careful because you could just get lost in the wind as the dust of life speeds up. And so you know that preschools through postgraduate programs are starting in the coming week. You know that there's a lot of people starting new jobs, taking up new titles, they're actually getting real responsibility if they got the title in the summer now that September is here. And you know that everybody who survived May through August without leaving the city is processing, committing their hearts for another year of what's to come here, and you're welcome for the reminder if you've been snoozing on that a little bit. But I bring this up to you just because we at Mosaic, we don't want you to get lost in the storm, in the wind, in the waves of life. We at Mosaic, we have a philosophy of ministry rooted in Ephesians 4:11-6 which says, and "He," the Lord, "gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers," and we pastors are shepherd, teachers, "to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Jesus Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes, rather speaking the truth and love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head into Christ, from the whole body joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped when each part is working properly." So at Mosaic, we are the pastors, we view our role to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, and we pause at this time of year to really calibrate your hearts, calibrate your minds to get prepared for really the program missional year ahead, for we don't want you to get lost into the waves and winds that come through life. And we know more than ever, since 2020, just how unpredictable life can be compared to those who grew up in the '90s and 2000s when things were pretty chill. Every year we hold this series and today's no different. Today, as the real new year approaches, again, I want to help us process in looking back, Pastor Jan will look ahead. And so the second reason though, why I say happy New Year is with facetiousness. As I acknowledge the approach of Boston's real New Year, I say it in a manner that's a little bit flippant and sarcastic. It's a year, it's really stating, "Thank God 2022, 2023 is over," in the words of a blessed beloved member of Mosaic in my mind I say happy New Year, there's a little bit of, "Bye Felicia," as I think of 2022, 2023. There's a, "Sayonara, goodbye. Good riddance. Let's turn the page and move on." And I say that because it was a hard year, and today I just want to acknowledge that I really wish that it was as simple as moving on, turning the page and everything will be different after Labor Day next week, but we need to be honest as a church that it was a hard year. And so today I hope to process that with you a little bit. Now, keeping the last two reasons in mind for why I say happy New Year, the third reason why I say happy New Year to start off this missional program year in the church is because I really mean it. I say it with deep sincerity. Why? Because even though I wouldn't have planned everything that the past year brought, even though it was excruciatingly painful personally as a church body, I'm so thankful that we as pastors, we as a membership, we as a body of believers here at Mosaic, went through what we went through. And just to give you a little bit, those of you who are new, in many years, it was a great year. We have a great membership at this church of a couple hundred people. People committed to be on mission here and we did maintain, we retained that membership and boy, did it grow up a lot. And I could give you dozens of examples of how people in this body came to faith, were baptized, grew in the faith, served the Lord through tremendous acts of charity and generosity, but really it was a year that was difficult. The trajectory of Mosaic's history, we're a church that was started in 2011, and that's a time when Pastor Jan really took over, rooted this church with the vision, the values, the beliefs, the identity that is very similar to what we promote right now. And 2011 through 2020 just basically putting it in simplistic terms, lots of growth, lots of seemingly flourishing on the outside and a lot on the inside. But since 2020, what did we deal with in 2023? 2020 poured over into 2021, poured over into 2022, poured over into 2023, and we're just catching our breath in the past year. At one point in the year we had three pastors, Pastor Shane, a beloved pastor was here for 10 years. He felt called home to the Midwest in the past year. He took an extended period of rest. Pastor Jan felt the effects of the strain of engaging all that came with just being a pastor in the past few years. And he took an extended break. I got a nice three weeks. I've never had that amount of time off in my adulthood. And so we as pastors, we as a body, we've faced challenges that we could have never imagined, and we're just feel like we're coming up from being underwater, grasping to stay afloat. And furthermore, we as a church, we confess to one another as a membership that we did commit some sin. There was some youthful, what we often phrase as youthful naivety, but there was some pride behind our method. Perhaps, we thought, "This is the way we're always going to go, just trajectory and growth as a body up, up, up." But furthermore, no, we pastors profess to this congregation that we functioned in our own strength a lot, especially since 2020. We didn't admit to one another when we needed rest, when we needed help, when we needed care. Furthermore, we were guilty of breaking the Sabbath and keeping it holy, and in many ways that emanated and trickled down in our body. And so praise God, we have a united body. We've processed a lot, we've been through a lot, sometimes from the public pulpit a lot of it, and members meetings, deep family talks over the past year. And I go back to why I say happy New Year sincerely, I'm thankful we went through it for we're a young body, young pastors, pretty naive. We don't have old saints to really guide us in the way and the Lord has matured us. So as I look ahead at the new year, I'm excited to think about what the Lord can do with this body of believers, what the Lord can do with me as someone who's grown up a lot as we look ahead to 2023, 2024. And so I begin with this happy New Year. I have pretty raw, transparent explanations for, and in my flesh, this is the time of the sermon where I want to switch back to Mosaic mode and really enter into classic Love Jesus Simple sermons. And if you go online, these are great sermons. Pastor Jan has preached these every year since 2011 except in 2020. And I want to just jump right into, "All right, said a little bit about what happened. Let's jump forward." But I want to use efficient language. I want to use just brilliant clear language that we've often used to articulate our vision. I want to make comparisons to our simple method of ministry to Chick-fil-A's simple method of business. I want to make comparisons to Michael Scott and Albert Einstein as we have over the years in pursuit of our vision and, of course, as all of their quotes pertain to scripture. But I don't want to run ahead, you're going to get that Pastor Jan, he's rearing and ready to go and I say, whatever you think, whatever you get today, come back. It's going to be very different. But realistically, we as pastors, we called an audible. I told Pastor Jan after coming back from my time off in the past week about what I've been processing, and really we're just trying to hit the heart of those in our body who are still ailing a little bit, coming out of what we went through, for it was hard. And so I'm not jumping into classic Love Jesus Simple mode. Today's not a classic expository sermon where we, in a very logical sense, pull the analysis of the textile and very systematic, orderly manner. This is really a very reflective pastoral sermon. And we just want to be cognizant that you guys have hearts and that the church is something you've invested in, and we really want to engage you where you are. And we are a body with many members with Christ as the head, and to go forward before we jump forward, and it's going to come fast next week and in the weeks beyond. We don't want anybody struggling, anybody holding on to pains, anybody questioning their commitment with us going ahead this year. And so I continue, therefore with a very transparent vulnerable tone, and I don't really want to go like this, but I think it's most appropriate to meet the season. So I just took three weeks off. It was my first chance to process this year and everything that transpired. And I have to admit that once I got a chance to breathe, once separated from the community, and I did have accountability in my wife, I wasn't just not working as a pastor and then rebelling and lashing out, no. I just want to be honest. I was really struggling with, "I just want to be a Christian by myself. Why do I need the church? It just makes everything so much harder. Why deal with the people? Why deal with the hardship? Why deal with standing on the truth? Why speak the truth to my brothers and sister in love when it often comes back to bite me? And then we have to do extra meetings to reconcile." And I wasn't thinking about quitting my job, I wasn't thinking about walking away from the faith, but I saw the appeal of letting myself continue in my thoughts, and it's been a great year actually outside of the church. Great year for me socially. I've lived in Brookline for three years. My son was in second grade. It's like all of a sudden I have all these social connections in the community that took a few years to cultivate. And so it's easy to think, "Man, I could start my own ministry, my own little circles outside this church and just run without the impediments of truly committing to the body that I've committed to love here at Mosaic and in Boston." And in an attempt exercise wisdom, first thing I did was said, "I'm tired. I need to rest," and so first week I just shut my mouth and prayed. And as I prayed approaching the trip and into that first week I just said, "Lord, bring me to the scriptures. Bring me to a Christian book. Bring me to a brother, a sister that can check my heart, check my mind, call me out in this position of frustration toward the church, disillusionment with the church," and the Lord in his grace was working on me and my wife at the same time at multiple times, separate ways we heard quotes and snippets of this book, Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. In the months leading to our time off, and separately unbeknownst to one another, we both ordered this book to read together during our time off, and there were multiple copies that arrived at our apartment and I said, "I ordered this. Why is there another one? Did you order one?" And the Lord providentially arranged for us separately to take up this book. And it really appealed to us too because we have three kids under seven and you can't really take up a giant tome like a giant biography or theological treaties. This is 122 pages, and it really unexpectedly just spoke right to the heart of just a lot of the questions and a lot of frustrations I was dealing with. And so today the main text is Ephesians 2:11-22. I will open that up a little bit but not open it up as much as we often do with the text. The general outline flow of the message is going to be a list of what Dietrich Bonhoeffer says are the blessings of Christian community. He asked the question, "Why is Christian community a blessing?" And he helps press us to think about, "Why should we... Why should I, Pastor Andy? Why should we continue to gather with other Christians?" And I know some people in our body in moments are dealing with that. I know that some people are new, and you might be coming here today, it could be your first time at church in years and you have pains and scars tied to dealing with church. And so I hope that this is an encouragement to those within our body already, those coming from the outside to really see the church as a blessing, see engagement with other Christians as an essential part to this life. And so the first point that I'll take up... And who is Dietrich Bonhoeffer? He was a Christian German pastor, theologian who was a pastor in the 1930s into the 1940s. And he saw the German church rooted in just the reformation of Martin Luther. He saw the German church leave God's word, leave the gospel and in its insecurity dealing with modernism, dealing with just technological advantages, dealing with politics, the German church in his day went with the Nazi party. And so he was one of a minority of pastors that started a new confessing church that stayed true to scripture. Ultimately he died as for being a part of a plot to try to kill Hitler. And ultimately he offers us perspective for what are essential elements for church, and really as part of the Love Jesus Simple series, I hope today I help strip apart any views of church, expectations of church, expectations of other Christians that might not be biblical, and a man who faced such pressures really has a lot of wisdom and insight for us. So why is a Christian community, a church, a blessing? First, Bonhoeffer says Jesus lived among his enemies. First paragraph, he just says this right away, "At the end of his life on earth, all of his disciples deserted him. On the cross he was utterly alone, surrounded by evildoers and mockers. For this cause, he had come to bring peace to the enemies of God." I don't know if you've ever thought about this, but Jesus entire walk on the earth was really full of disappointment with community. Who rejected him? His brothers, the Jews. And then even his disciples, those intimate 12, even within the 12, his top three, they all were not there at the end. They all left him, and then the 72 and greater crowds came and went as they agreed and disagreed with his teachings. And so when we face hardship in community, we're not facing something that the Lord himself did not face. And this is to start with this point, it's a kind of logic that says, "You think you have had it bad in your situation in your church. Think about how bad Christ had it, yet he endured faithfully to the end." And it's an effort to counter any entitlement we as Christians have thinking we deserve better. We deserve a better church. We deserve to be received better. Christ himself, if anybody of all people in the history of the earth, the Son of God deserved to be received better in community, and he really never was. And are we greater than him? John 13:16, "Truly, truly I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor a messenger is greater than the one who sent him." And so this isn't really the kind of reason to show the blessedness of Christian community that's soothing to the soul. But I love that Bonhoeffer begins with this. He says, sorry he doesn't say this. Because if we really understand the extent that God went through Christ to show us love for us, the fact that Christ in the trinity, in the wisdom of the trinity, Father, Son, and Spirit for all eternity took on flesh to come and walk among enemies, walk among flakes that would abandon him simply to come, primarily to come and be our savior just fathoming that, fathoming the love of God shows us in doing that, that really should help us to look upon our struggles in this life with Christians and even the greater world, with a little more humility, we should be amazed what the Lord endured for us to procure our salvation. So why is Christianity a blessing? Because Christ didn't have it yet he is gracious enough to offer us the chance to gather with others. Second, why is Christian community a blessing? Many Christians Bonhoeffer says, don't experience community. He says, "It is by the grace of God that a congregation is permitted to gather visibly in the world to share God's word and sacrament. Not all Christians receive this blessing. The imprisoned, the sick, the scattered, lonely, the proclaimers of the gospel in heathen lands, they stand alone." Do you ever pause when you're pondering the challenges that come with gathering with the church, that there are people, there are Christians all throughout the world, people all throughout history who profess the name of Christ who don't have a regular gathering assembly of believers to gather with, people who don't have pastors to open up the word for them? And the truth is those of us who do have it, we take our community for granted, and this is my mind, my heart was drifting in this direction. "It is true of course," "Bonhoeffer says, "that what is an unspeakable gift of God for the lonely individual is easily disregarded and trodden underfoot by those who have the gift every day. It is easily forgotten that the fellowship of a Christian brethren is a gift of grace, a gift of the kingdom of God that any day may be taken from us, that the time still separates us from utter loneliness may be brief indeed." And so if we have it, we should function with the awareness that the Lord could strip it right away. And how many of you... As I processed just my thoughts, my approach towards the church, I asked myself this question, "What would happen if Mosaic Boston Church just closed its doors, it just disappeared?" And I didn't really pause to think like this all throughout the turmoil of recent seasons, but I realized I would be broken. I wouldn't be broken to the point of despair and unbelief, but I'd still have Christ, but man, it would be so hard to face that and just this perspective, others in the world do not have what we have. And so seasons of turmoil, they're not fun. But we should still bless the Lord and be thankful that he has provided our community. Third, Bonhoeffer goes on to say why the church is a blessing. "The physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength for the believer. The physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength for the believer." To support this, he mentions how Paul in 2 Timothy 1:4 talks about his longing to see Timothy in the flesh. Next, he talks about how the Apostle John in 2 John 12 says that his joy will not be complete until he can come to his people and speak face to face instead of writing to them. Do you long to come to church and see your brothers and sisters like this? Bonhoeffer says, "It's okay to feel no shame... He says, "The believer feels no shame as though he was still living too much in the flesh when he yearns for the physical presence of other Christians. Man was created by a body, man was created a body. The son of God appeared on earth in the body. He was raised in the body and the resurrection of the dead will bring about the perfected fellowship of God's spiritual physical creatures. The believer therefore lauds the creator, the redeemer, God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit for the bodily presence of a brother." So Christ taking on a flesh shows us that this world, this life, the relationships we forge, especially in the church, matter. And it's okay as a Christian to say, "Lord, I need you," as we sung earlier, "but I also need my church," and to get excited about gathering with other Christians. And I ask, do you have these people that you see and they just give you joy and strength? And I definitely feel this way broadly about Mosaic. I got to visit three different churches while I was taking my time off, three different worship services and they're good churches, love the Lord, preach the gospel, but it just wasn't the same as gathering with you. When I'm here, as processing the worship music, there's different things that every member of our band does that encourage me. Aaron put his hands up here in the front and I'm a stiff guy, but he encourages me to worship with more passion, and this body, there's so many people who encourage me like that. But in terms of just outside of worship, are there people who bring you joy and comfort Christians, people who you don't really even have to talk to them but their presence brings you joy? And I can think of so many people here in the church who provide that, but do you have them, and if you don't, are you seeking to build those relationships? Only in commitment to a local church can you forge such relationships. People, friends that are nonbelievers can't be this presence for you in your life. And what's the benefit of them? Whether you have a great spoken relationship or it's really just about the presence, there's some kind of encouragement that comes with gathering with people who believe what you believe, who are fighting the good fight. Sometimes they stumble but they get back, they receive grace, they keep going and they just keep walking forward in the direction you're trying to go. And at Mosaic, that's what we're trying to do every Sunday and as part of our service, create a warm hospital strengthening environment and with community groups. A lot of times people come into our church and we have community groups that do discuss every week's sermon together. They do sermon discussion, fellowship, just hanging out and prayer. But really we're trying to forge bonds where it's just the unspeakables of gathering that breed encouragement with one another. It's not necessarily just about the discussion and conversation. We want people gathering simply because they love each other and are encouraged by one another. And Paul and John show us that, that happens. And the thing about it is that we should pursue this, we should desire these kinds of relationships, but we should not become codependent, overly dependent on such relationships. For once we do so we commit the sin of idolatry and we're looking upon these relationships for our sense of satisfaction, strength, peace, joy instead of looking to Jesus Christ himself. And that's one of the main things that happens, we have a really young body, lots of people, very driven, lots of people who came to the city for academic programs, for work. The way they grew was finding mentors, finding training and studying and climbing the way to the top, and they approach Christianity the same way. And I'm saying we want you to get relationships. We want you to build bonds where there's this unspoken connection. We want you to build a mentor relationships where there is spoken connection, but we don't want you to be overdependent on them. We want Christians to develop abiding relationships with the Lord where they one-on-one are engaging the Lord in their minds through prayer, in song, in worship, independently of others, for that is ultimately just the most life-giving relationship we can have. So we just don't want to overemphasize these relationships. Next, why is a Christian community a blessing? And this is the hardest one to chew on, but if you get this, this is the greatest source of encouragement. Bonhoeffer says, "A christian has an alien righteousness and needs to be reminded of it constantly." So the Christian community is a blessing because it's a place where a Christian can go and be reminded of who they are in Jesus. What do I mean by alien righteousness? He says, "The Christian is the man or woman who no longer seeks his salvation. He's not trying to earn his way to God's love and favor. The Christian is the man who no longer seeks his salvation, his deliverance, his justification, his declaration that he is not guilty before God in himself but in Christ alone. The Christian no longer lives of himself by his own claims and his own justification, but by God's claims and God's justification." "The reformers expressed it this way, our righteousness, our right standing before God is an alien righteousness that comes from outside of us. The reformers were saying that the Christian is dependent on the word of God spoken to them. God has willed that we should seek and find his living word in the witness of a brother in the mouth of a man." And there's scriptures that really open this up. God chose the foolishness of the preaching of men, of broken vessels to save people. God chooses the foolishness of his broken vessels in the church to exhort one another with the word. There's a lot of scripture around this. But what Bonhoeffer is stating is that the way Christian is saved with this alien righteousness, this right standing before God being applied to him by the Lord himself from the outside, the way Christian is saved through this signifies the way that he needs to be encouraged over and over again after he is saved. And when you understand this, he's really defining how a church should get engaged. A man is saved by that which is outside of him, the righteousness of Christ coming to him and therefore over and over he needs to be reminded of that when he stumbles in sin, when he's discouraged by the events and circumstances around him, when the church faces hardship, a person, a Christian needs to be reminded of who they are that their right standing despite their circumstances before God does not change. And the thing about it is God has willed whether we like it or not, that the way that we are reminded of who we are in Christ is by other people, brothers and sisters in the church. And so if you're not gathering in a church, you do not have people who can remind you that you are not a sinner. When you fall into the just being overcome by guilt and shame, you are a beloved son and daughter of the living and true God because Jesus Christ died on the cross for you. What happens when a person is saved, when they turn and receive God's forgiveness? They believe that their sinful record is applied to Jesus Christ, and in turn his perfect righteous record is applied to them, and it's a whole process initiated by God through the Holy Spirit. And once we experience this, we know who we are but we forget over and over again, and so what is the church? It's the place that we go to, to be reminded of who we are in Jesus. For when we know at the fundamental level the source of our identity, when we understand all of the promises of God, that we are forgiven of our sins, we're beloved adopted son or daughter, we are bestowed with the inheritance due to the firstborn. All the covenant promises due to the Old Testament fathers apply to us in Jesus when we have security of identity in who we are through this alien righteousness that's gifted to us, we can face the world, we can face others with the sobriety of mind and heart, and boldness that God can use us in the process. And so what is the church? It's the place not where you go because there's people who might look like you, might be at a similar age, might have similar interests of you, might be in a similar life phase of you. You go to the church to be reminded of who you are in Jesus Christ, first and foremost. And that is the single most important center of your bond to the church. And as a member of a church, you have to fight to keep that central with the challenges of seasons, with the desires of the flesh, with the competing models and preferences that you have, that people in the church have. You have to look first and foremost at the church and identify, "Does this church remind me of who I am in Jesus?" And what does that change? The way we engage with one another. There is a huge part for listening to one another and Bonhoeffer has a great section on listening as one of the primary practices within the church. But we also speak the word to one another and it's not therapy. We're not just consoling one another and trying to make each other feel better in the moment. A lot of our communication in the church when you understand we are all bonded together as recipients of this alien righteousness. We are the common practice. The way we engage is reminding of ourselves who we are in Jesus. And when we do that, we are setting ourselves up to be able to face all the challenges of life church around us. And Pastor Jan talked about this a lot over the years as we are not here... Once you know you're saved in Jesus, your identity is secured, the Father will never leave you or forsake you, and you have newness and you have freedom, and you have innocence before the Lord that even stumblings and sin can't take away for you after you turn and repent. And so what we are doing, church is not, "I come and go to the sanctuary to receive therapy." It's the halftime talk. It's where we remind you of who you are in Jesus. You have all the promises and power of God working for you, and we are here to boost you up, build you up before we send you out, and then you have community group to get a little boost midweek as well. And so the church is the place, it's a blessing because we are reminded that we are recipients of this alien righteousness. And I connect this if you're not really buying fallen Bonhoeffer for following me on this, this is really a point that Paul makes in Ephesians 2:11-22, the text for the day in verses 11:12, it begins with a description of alienation separation between Jewish and Gentile Christians. Verse 11 says, "Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh called the uncircumcision, but what is called the circumcision," that Jewish believers, "which is made in the flesh by hand, remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world." So what's going on here? Paul is saying there's a conflict in the community, from the context of the passage, we don't know exactly what the conflict is given the rest of the book and the specific verses. It seems to be rooted in the racial and ethnic differences, Christians, people who are Christian highlighting their ethnic, religious and racial differences. But important thing to point out is there is a conflict and how does the apostle Paul tell them how to face it? What does he do? Verse 13, he reminds him of their hopelessness and exclusion from God's family, the Gentiles particularly. He reminds him of their hopelessness and exclusion from God's family before Christ came and died for them. Verse 13, "But now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ." Once you were alienated, once you were hopeless without the promises of God applied to you, without chance of coming into God's family, but now because of the blood of Christ, because this alien righteousness that comes to you, you are brought near to the Lord himself, "For he himself is our peace who has made us both one and has broken down in the flesh the dividing wall of hostility." It's a really frustrating piece of advice like, if you're in conflict with someone and someone says, "Remember who you are, that's the way forward." In a way, Paul is doing that. He's telling the Gentile Christians and then all of us Christians today for when we face conflict, really if you really remember who you were, whether you're Jew or Gentile in this situation, but God and his mercy was gracious to you. He offered forgiveness of sin. He saved you despite your rebellion against him. If you really process that, this identity that has been gifted to you, you can look upon your brethren and offer a similar grace and mercy to them. And so if you remember who you are that'll inform your way forward and help you to go forward faithfully. And one of, in Christianity, the main area where we see instruction similarly, Mark 10-9, "Let not man separate what God has put together," with regard to marriage. Every good Christian marriage knows that there's points in the marriage because it's two sinners come together who both need grace from God and each other daily. There are going to be times where conflict and trial are so large that the only thing that makes them stick together is the belief that God has established their relationship, and that's the logic that Bonhoeffer, that Paul are trying to teach us. They're trying to get us to view our sense of personal security with God derived from the identity that he has given us. And furthermore, trying to say we have a bond with other believers and that bond was forged by God, and we need to commit and covenant and hold fast to our commitment to other believers, not walk on them or isolate ourselves from them because God has established the capacity for us to have peaceful relationship with them. And so it's not really practical, but he's calling through this appealing to alien righteousness. Paul and Bonhoeffer, they're saying it's a call in our walk with the Lord individually, how do we correct ourselves? We remember who we are in Jesus. We remember this gifted identity that we have. For our walk in the church, we remember the gift that our community is and there's greater spiritualties. As an individual, who we are is not the one who is stumbling in sin over and over again. Who we are is a beloved son and daughter, and that's how we should view and see ourselves and that's what's going to help us march forward. Who we are in community is so much more than a body of believers at stray and get in the fickle arguments often. What does Paul say to end the passage? Paul alludes to, there's so much more spiritually going on with our believers. And Bonhoeffer and Paul, the next line, Bonhoeffer says, another reason why Christian community is a blessing is because we are going to be with each other in eternity. And so there's greater spiritual realities that we are called to live up to as individuals and as a body. And to continue what I was saying, Paul says, he appeals to these greater communal realities that take place when a group of people gather. In verse 19 it says, "So then you're no longer strangers and aliens, but you're fellow citizens, Jew and Gentile. You're fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the spirit." So what is taking place when Christians truly rooted in their identity in Christ, this blessed gracious gift of an identity that they have when they gather in community. There's some sort of spiritual holy, eternal temple suited to be a dwelling place of God that is being constructed. And I say that and we're getting up into the sky, but that's a reality that is happening when we covenant, when we commit to live with one another, when we don't isolate with one another, when we disagree but come and love one another and work out conflict for God's glory, this spiritual structure is being built. And does it always feel like that? No. When we look back at the past year, did it feel like we were building this glorious, heavenly structure as we faced a lot of hardship that we never faced as a young church before? No, but we need to function with faith that, that is actually taking place as we go forward in faith loving one another, calling one another to the identity that we have in Jesus and the faithful ways forward, repentance of sin and faith. And so one of the things that Bonhoeffer really points out to close, I just want to bring up a thought. He says that until a church is really united and gathering around just the fact that everyone has this alien identity applied to them, this alien righteousness applied to them, until that is revealed as the primary connection point between a body of believers, the Lord is going to strip away pretty painfully all of those other things that appear to be the central bond that brings them together, and it's in his mercy. He could just bring wrath and punishment for the folly of gathering around other things, but in his mercy, he strips away all that gets at the heart of our true bond with one another, which is our faith in Jesus Christ and his saving work and in his sanctifying work in our lives. Bonhoeffer frames it like this, "The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is vital between us." And that when you think about the past couple of years facing a little more challenges as a body, that's what I see happening. That's what we pastors see happening. Scripture talks about us maturing. Scripture talks about us being pruned. God is a vine dresser, and as we hold fast to Jesus, and we are the branches, he's going to pull off those fruits that are taken away, the nourishment for the good fruit and he's going to refine us, put us in the fire. That's what God does to make sure that Christ stays central as the primary gathering point for our body, and that's love Jesus simple with Jesus at the center. Pastor Jan will elaborate in a whole lot more detail in a technical sense on how we apply these things. And I couldn't help but think that Bonhoeffer or Paul, they're alluding to imagery that comes with our name, our logo, Mosaic. "You are united by the blood of Christ," says Paul. "You are united by this alien righteousness that comes with believing in the blood and the cross of Christ," says Bonhoeffer. And isn't that what a mosaic is? We're a bunch of pieces, different shapes, different sizes, different backgrounds, different colors, different language, different nationalities, coming from different socioeconomic strata, life perspective, church background, non-church background, uniting together around the saving work of Jesus Christ. And my prayer, as I say, happy real New Year. My prayer before we cast the vision for next year is that Christ shows us more deeply that the most vital thing between us all is Jesus Christ and his work. And if he has to continue to strip it away in slightly painful ways or sometimes really painful ways, then all praise and glory to God because ultimately we're developing a more pure and unified bond as saints and followers with him. So let me pray in closing. Heavenly Father, we praise you for just the blessing that this church has been. We thank you as our 12th birthday is coming up in October, we thank you that I could have spent weeks talking about just amazing stories of seeing your saving hand just call dead sinners to life in Jesus Christ and bring them to freedom from the power of sin in their lives. I could spend just weeks talking about ways that communities, brothers and sisters walking together have served you in the form of doing charitable generous works, have served each other in terms of speaking the truth and love, calling each other to accountability to the identity that you have bestowed upon them. I thank you that we really have had such a blessed experience as your saints here in this city, in our short lifespan. But Lord, I praise you all the more for the hard lessons that you've provided in the past year. And Lord, we thank you for the perspective. We thank you for the maturity, the insight that we have developed for facing them. And Lord, I just ask, give us power to hold fast to you, hold fast to the cross of Jesus Christ, to always preach it, to always teach it, to always point ourselves first and foremost to it and your offer of salvation in it when we face personal challenges, when we face collective challenges as a body moving forward. Lord Mayor, we pray that our light would continue to shine brightly in this city, and we do ask for a harvest, Lord, just pour out the rains from heaven where you just call just thousands of people home in the months in the season ahead. I pray this then in Jesus name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Forgive from the Heart

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 20, 2023 55:09


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic Boston Church. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston, or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your holy scriptures. We thank you for the Book of Genesis, the book of beginnings, we come to the end of it today. A book that begins with a garden and perfect peace, with Adam and Eve walking with you in the cool of the day. It ends with two deaths. It ends with two coffins. And we pray that today you remind us that because of our sin, because of our rebellion, we are sinners by nature and by choice. Death is in the world and death will come to each one of us if the Lord should tarry. And Lord, I pray you make us the people that meditate upon death. As hard as it is, it is an important spiritual discipline to think about. How do we want to be remembered? What kind of legacy do we want to leave? And Lord, we thank you for the gospel of Jesus Christ. We thank you that your son lived the perfect life, walked with you perfectly, never sinned, fulfilled the law of God from the heart. You loved God, and you love neighbor, Jesus, so much so that you offered yourself up on the cross in order to redeem us. And we thank you Jesus that you did not stay dead and we thank you that through your resurrection, you have conquered Satan, sin, and death. And in your death, we see the death of death itself. And make us a people who trust in your word and recognizing that when we believe in you, repent of sin, we are granted eternal life. It's eternal life that begins now and continues through all of eternity. And Lord, we thank you for the lessons that we have learned from the life of Joseph, from the life of Jacob, as we remember their faith and their faithfulness, we also recognize that there were times when they were faithless. And still because they were yours, because they were your elect, you remain faithful to them. And Lord remain faithful to us. We trust in that promise and give us grace. Grace to have our sins forgiven and grace to then extend forgiveness to others when they sin against us. We thank you for the reminder of how important unity is in the church of God and I pray that you unite us, recognizing that the blood of Jesus Christ and the unity that he gives us triumphs over anything that could potentially divide us. We pray that you bless our time, the Holy Scriptures, Holy Spirit, we love you, we welcome you, and we pray that you deepen our love for you as we meditate upon your word. And we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series called Graduate Level Grace, actually ending it today. A study in the life of Joseph. Today we're in Genesis 50. Next Sunday is our annual vision sermon. So if you are looking for a church, if you are church shopping, definitely come back next week and we, by the power of God, hopefully will show you of the importance of a gospel proclaiming church, a faithful church in a place like Boston. And then after that, we will start a brand new sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We're calling it Kingdom Come: The Gospel of Mark and the secret of God's kingdom in which we'll meditate. And what it means is that Jesus is king and what it means that we are part of his kingdom, that we have been transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of his beloved son, and what it means to be kingdom minded. Today the title of the sermon is Forgive from the Heart. The Book of Genesis, the book of beginnings, begins with life. God creates life and he creates humanity and everything is perfect and shalom. And then the Book of Genesis ends with death, two deaths actually, the death of Jacob and the death of Joseph. And you say, what happened? It started in such a promising way and such a promising note and it ends with death. And the answer is sin. The answer is, rebellion and rejection of God's reign and rule ushered in death. And Jacob here we're told is buried in the Promised Land as a testimony to the promises God has made in the past. And Joseph's body is put in a coffin in Egypt as a testimony to the fact that he believed that God would bring his promises to pass in the future via the Exodus. And both these godly men die in the Lord, which is a great blessing. Revelation 14:13 says, "And I heard a voice from heaven saying, "Write this. Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on." "Blessed indeed," says the spirit, "that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them." Blessed is to die in the Lord. To die as a believer. Blessed is to die well and to have your funeral be a celebration of your life. Blessed it is to live in such a way where people do want to come to your funeral, and people do have many a good thing, a blessed thing to say about your life. My wife and I, we took a vacation, a trip last summer to Vail, Colorado. And my goodness, it was incredible. Vail is so beautiful. And we're sitting on the porch outside of the hotel room and we have this incredible mountain view and everything's perfect, the food was perfect, the views were perfect, everything's perfect. And when everything's perfect, the Slavic in us, we come from a Slavic background, the Slavic in us wants to be reminded that there is pain in the world. And we decided it would be wise to partake in one of the most painful exercises you could possibly partake. And my wife asked me, she said, "And when I die, what will you say at my funeral?" And then I was like, hold on, I got to think about it. And then as I'm thinking about it, I'm like, okay, what would I say? Many a good thing. I'm going to save it till her funeral. And then I said, "What are you going to say about me at my funeral?" And it was so beautiful and so heart-wrenching, heartwarming, we're just weeping. We're just sitting here and beautiful, weeping. But it was a wonderful reminder of the fact that we will die. And then if you reverse engineer how you want to live in order to be remembered in a positive way, well, how should you live? And I've done many a funeral and I will tell you it's a world of difference when the person that dies dies in the Lord, than a person that had nothing to do with God or there was no evidence of faith in God. People kind of say the same stuff, but you know it comes from a different place when the person was truly a believer secure in the hands of God. What do people say at funerals? Well, the person is now in a better place. If you're a believer or not, everyone says the same thing, even at an unbeliever's funeral. No one wants to say, "Yeah, this person was a pagan and wicked had nothing to do with God." No, they say, "They're in better place." Well, we are to prepare in life for death in order for those words to be true. In the Book of Numbers, Balaam was hired by Balak to curse Israel, but he ends up blessing them, and this is what he says in Numbers 23:10, "Who can count the dust of Jacob or number the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the upright, and let my end be like his." Let me die the death of the upright. In chapter 48, we saw Jacob's greatest act of faith, as singled out in the Hall of Faith Hebrews 11, when he blessed the sons of Joseph, when he crossed his hands, which is an incredible example and actually prophecy of the cross of Jesus Christ. But in Hebrews 11:22 in the Hall of Faith, it says that what Joseph does in this chapter was Joseph's greatest act of faith. Hebrews 11:22 says, "By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones." Joseph, on his deathbed, spoke of the exodus, of the promises of God concerning the exodus, and he demanded to be buried back in the land of Canaan, although he realized it's going to be centuries before the people of God are led out of Egypt. From all appearances, Joseph had at this time by the end of his life, already been an Egyptian through and through. He was an Egyptian from the day of his captivity when he was 17 to when he was elevated to prominence in the Egyptian court at age 30 and he married an Egyptian woman, followed Egyptian laws, carried an Egyptian name. But his dying words show that he had been a stranger in the midst of it all. His citizenship was not in Egypt, it was in heaven. Though he ruled in Egypt, Egypt did not rule in him. He was in the world, but he was not of the world. No worldly influence or power or authority or success distracted him from his faith in God. And as truly as his fathers who would dwell in tents, he too felt like he had no continuing city here. He continued to believe in God and his promises, and he continued to look by faith into the future. Before we look at Genesis 50, just one verse right before to set the context. Jacob on his deathbed blessed his sons, and then Genesis 48:33, it says, "When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and he was gathered to his people." Jacob's body was still in the room, but his soul was gathered to the people of God and he was reunited with his fathers. As Jesus said, "Before Abraham was, I am." And then the Pharisees were like, what are you talking about? That's blasphemy. And he said, "Have you not read? God says I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God is not the God of the dead but of the living." Three points to frame up our time as we walk through the text, a father celebrated, a family reconciled, and a promise believed. So first of Father celebrated. Genesis 50 verse one. "Then Joseph fell on his father's face and wept over him and kissed him. And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. Forty days were required for it, for that is how many are required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him for seventy days" Before Jacob took the trek to Egypt with all of his family, he asked God, "God, are you going with me?" And God met him and said, "Fear not. I will go with you and I will bless you. And your son Joseph is going to close your eyes in death." The other brothers were certainly present at the deathbed of Jacob and they too grieved the death of his father. But Joseph's grief is highlighted here. His love for his father is highlighted here. His affection for his father. He's weeping over him. Why? Because first of all, he stood closer to his father than the other brothers. And also he is experiencing a pain accentuated by the fact that he had lost years of relationship with his father. There's grief, but then there's restrained, godly grief. Joseph is weeping, and after he is done weeping, he then goes into action. Why? Because his grief is like that of a believer. We grieve but not like those without hope. Joseph knows that he too will go to be with his father in the presence of God, just like Jacob did. Joseph here is 56 years of age when his father Jacob died. If you remember, he was 17 when he was sold into captivity by his brothers. And then he was 30 when he rose to prominence in power and in Pharaoh's Court. And then there were seven years of plenty and then two years of famine. And at age 39, his family moved to Goshen. And then Jacob spent 17 years, the last 17 years of his life, with Joseph, just like Joseph had spent the first 17 years of his life with his father. It says that the Egyptians wept for Jacob for 70 days. And this is really important because the Egyptians wept for Pharaoh. When a pharaoh would die, the king of Israel, the Egyptians would weep 72 days. So here we have a feeble shepherd who was revered almost as highly as royalty. Why? Because of his son. Because his son saved the people. And the people recognize that apart from Joseph and his wisdom that God gave him, they would've ended up dead. And sometimes fathers provide for their children early on and sometimes children ended up providing for their parents. I tell my girls this, I have four daughters. I remember when my oldest for the very first time, she was like nine, she washed my car. And I was so pumped and I was like finally, a little ROI. A little return on investment. But we do. We pour into our kids and as we raise the children and recognize the children by God's grace will care for us in our old age. There is no burial recorded in scripture quite as honorable as this with such a wealth of detail. And Joseph commands the physicians, it says, to embalm his father. Not the mortuary priests. His wife was part of the priest cast in Egypt, but it's not the priest that come in and do the embalming. No, it's the doctors, the physicians. Why does Joseph do this? First of all, he wants everyone to know we're not doing this for religious purposes. There's a practical purpose here. The practical purpose in embalming Jacob is to transport his body into Canaan, the Promised Land, just like Jacob had commanded Joseph and the son. So the pagan embalming procedure is used by the Lord God here. So Jacob and Joseph are the only two Israelites of whom the scriptures tell that they were embalmed, not for religious value, but strictly for feasible transportation. Genesis 50 verse 4, "And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, "If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, "My father made me swear, saying, "I'm about to die: in my tomb that I hewed out for myself in the land of Canaan, there shall you bury me." Now therefore, let me please go up and bury my father. Then I will return. And Pharaoh answered, Go up, and bury your father, as he made you swear." Joseph being the wise administrator that he is, he understands how the political court works. Although he's second in command to Pharaoh, he understands authority. He understands he's in authority, and he understands he's under authority. So he doesn't want to pull rank. And he understands that Pharaoh would be apprehensive about letting such a trusted official go with his whole tribe, his whole family back to the land of Canaan. Especially given that Joseph knew sensitive information about Egypt and the inner workings, and such clandestine information would be very valuable to the enemies of Egypt. So Joseph understands he needs Pharaoh's clearance, so he asks. Joseph is given his request to go back, and on top of that, he's given a large entourage to escort Jacob for the internment. It's a massive funeral entourage. Hundreds of people made up the retinue. In verse 7 it says, "So Joseph went up to bury his father. With him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household, and all the elders of the land of Egypt, as well as all the household of Joseph, his brothers, and his father's household. Only their children, their flocks, and their herds were left in the land of Goshen. And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company. The text emphasizes that the children, the livestock, were left in Goshen, to emphasize the fact that they felt so secure in leaving the children, the little ones in Goshen. That's how much God had blessed the people of Israel. He'd given them security, he'd given them land. And we see the entourage led by Joseph, and it's almost a mini rehearsal for the ultimate homecoming of the children of Israel out of Egypt via the exodus. And actually the route they took was the same exact one as Israel would take centuries later after the Exodus. In verse 10, "When they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a great and grievous lamentation, and he made a mourning for his father seven days." The Egyptian custom of those days were where when you get to the place of burial, the point of burial, you take another seven days of lamentation. So we're up to 77 days that people lamented the death of Jacob. And this is important. I think this is important for us because we live in a society that idolizes youth and we don't respect people in their older age and we don't think about honoring them and their death. We don't think about honoring them after their death. And this morning my dad, he sent me a text message, iMessage from Estonia, he's in Estonia right now, my country of origin, and he's there with my mom. And he takes a pilgrimage almost every single year. And every time he goes to Estonia, he goes to the cemetery where his mom is buried and where his grandparents are buried. And they take care of their little plot of land, put flowers there. And I remember when I was younger, I was like, that's kind of silly because they're in heaven, right? We believe that they're in heaven, their souls are in heaven. But he's doing it as a way to honor them. Honor their remembrance, and honor their sacrifice for him and for us. And this is important, I think it's important for us to really celebrate those who came before us and to honor them and their death and honor them after their death and the memory of them. And this is what the Lord Jesus told us in the celebration of the last supper. He said, "Do this for what purpose? Do this in remembrance of me." Every time we take the cup and the bread, we're remembering the death of our Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrifice and resurrection. Verse 11 of chapter 50, when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning on the threshing floor of Atad, they said, "This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians," and therefore the place was named Abel-mizraim. Abel-mizraim means mourning of Egypt. Verse 12, "Thus his sons did for him as he had commanded them, for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah to the east of Mamre, which Abraham bought with the field from Efron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone up with him to bury his father." So Jacob's sons take over here in the very final and most intimate part of the service. They are the ones that bury their father. They are the ones that lay him in his final resting place for his body. And the emphasis in the text is his sons, all his sons are unified in that. They obey the commandment of their father. Perhaps for the first time, all 12 of them are unified in obedience of their father. We see them as submissive, dutiful, faithful. They're truly changed men. And then that whole family goes back to Egypt, goes back to Goshen. And now the question is, well, how then will they live? Now that Jacob's influence as the patriarch, as the loving father on all 12 sons. Are they going to live in unity and reconciliation? And the text says yes. Point two is the family reconciled. Verse 15, "When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him." So they sent a message to Joseph saying, "Your father gave this command before he died: Say to Joseph, please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you." And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him. So the brother is realizing their father is dead, understandably they're worried. And they're wondering, was he nice to us just because of dad? He's been benevolent to us, but is the benevolence just a mask for malevolent intent? Was he really just harboring resentment and biding his time? So they sent a message to Joseph. They don't go personally just yet. First they want to test the waters. Who do they send? Most likely they sent the youngest son Benjamin because he was loved by both sides of the family. And when Joseph hears this message, he weeps. Why does he weep? Because if these words are true, that Jacob said this, then he's weeping over the fact that his father Jacob did not trust him, did not trust his intentions, did not trust his words. If it's not true, if Jacob did not say this, then Joseph is weeping over the fact that his brothers still don't trust him. And there was no ground for mistrust. Joseph's forgiveness had been without condition. To have his sincere motives questioned was painful, especially after 17 years of care and provision. And you got to stop and you got to wonder, why would they question Joseph after 17 years of his love toward them and word indeed? Well, most likely they're projecting their own guilt on him. Most likely they haven't dealt completely with their guilt and their sin. And most likely they're thinking, okay, if we were sold into captivity by Joseph, and if we were in power over him, and now that dad's not here to protect him, what would we do? And in their sinfulness, they think, you know what? We would probably make him pay for his sins. And that's why it's so important in this message. They say, "Please forgive the transgression." They use the word transgression. They use the word sin, and they use the word evil. They recognize that they've transgressed, not just against God, but against his brother. They've sinned, not just against God, but against their brother. They've committed evil, not against just God, but his and their brother. And what do they call themselves? Forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father. For the first time the text tells us that they confess allegiance to the God of the universe. He's our God, not just the God of our Father. They repent and Joseph is weeping. So they got the message that Joseph is weeping. In verse 18 it says, "His brothers also came and they fell down before him and said, "Behold, we are your servants." But Joseph said to them, "Do not fear for am I in the place of God. As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones." Thus he comforted them and he spoke kindly to them. Their sorrow and their repentance is genuine. It's sincere. That's why they come on the heels of the messenger and they offer themselves to Joseph as slaves. And we got to pause and just say it's incredible how God worked in this family, how he's been growing this family. We see spiritual growth and maturity. We see the brothers humble themselves before their younger brother, a sibling they once hated. And they confess their sin and wrongdoing and they prostrate themselves before their brother just as Joseph once dreamed. Why is this emphasized in the last chapter of the book? Well, because finally this family is healed. Finally, this family is united. Finally, this family understands the grace of God. I don't know about your family situation, your family of origin, your current family. But I will tell you this, that apart from grace, you cannot have a true united loving relationship that's going to last the test of time. We need grace. Why? Because we're all sinners and we sin against one another. The forgiveness of Joseph gives is a full forgiveness, and it reminds us of the forgiveness of Joseph's antitype, the greater Joseph, which is the Lord Jesus Christ. And we can be assured of this, that when we repent of our sins and trust in Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven completely. The forgiveness is permanent. And we are forgiven for the penalty of our sins forever. For those who are in Christ Jesus, there is no condemnation. And when the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross and he bore the sins of sinners, he satisfied the divine justice for those for whom he died. Consequently, heaven can bring no new charges against those for whom the Lord has paid a full debt. God does not require the debt to be paid twice. The saved are safe and secure thanks to the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. But there are seasons when we doubt this, are there not? Are there seasons in your life, dear believer, when you wonder, did Jesus completely forgive me? Am I truly secure in the hands of God? Or have I lost my relationship with God? And those seasons, for the true believer, those seasons are helpful, because those seasons cause us to wonder, why? Why do I have these doubts? The scriptures are clear that those who believe in Jesus Christ have eternal life immediately. It begins now and continues through return. Most likely we have those doubts because there's current sin in our lives. And then we've got to pause and say, what do I do? Well, you've got to repent of that sin and turn from it and turn back to the Lord. Go back to the cross of Jesus Christ. And we through our life of obedience of faith are to confirm that our election is true. And Joseph says, "Do not fear for am I in the place of God." Do I have the right to judge you? I'm not God over you. I have the power to judge you, but I don't have the right to judge you. And he reminds them that God is the ultimate judge and all wrongs are to be righted by him. Friend, when you are wronged by someone, what is the first inclination of your heart? Most likely it's to seek vengeance. And the Lord says, "No, no, no. When you're sinned against, remember vengeance is mine. I will repay," said the Lord. 1 Thessalonians 5:15," See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. "Joseph continues says, "As for you, you meant evil against me. But God meant it for good." And here we have a classic statement on the doctrine of providence and specifically God's concurrence. And that doctrine means that God can override, he chooses to override the evil consequences of the wicked to bring about a blessing. And the holy God overrides our sin while simultaneously remaining unsullied by it. One commentator says that God handles sin sinlessly. What could I do to interfere with God's plan even if I desire to do so is Joseph's sentiment. God is the ultimate governor of the universe. And it was the similar sentiment of Joseph back in chapter 45 when the brothers started the process of reconciliation in Genesis 45:5. "And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and the ruler over all the land of Egypt." You sold me, but it was God who sent me. God is a holy God, he's not the author of evil. He's holy, and therefore no holiness proceeds from him. But God does determine that evil exists in the universe in order to accomplish a greater good that would exist if he had not determined that evil should exist. Why? To manifest His glory through justice and grace, god determines that sin exists in the universe. And to really grasp this, it's important to meditate on the question, who crucified Jesus Christ? Who crucified our Lord and Savior? If you look at John 18 where Jesus is in the garden in Gethsemane, he told his disciples to pray, stay awake, be watchful. The flesh is weak but the spirit is strong. And the disciples fall asleep and then the soldiers are there. And then Judas points out who Jesus is. And Peter out of nowhere is awakened. And then Peter takes out a sword and he attempts to cut off the head of one of the servants that came. And he was still asleep, a little groggy. He missed the head and only nipped the ear. And then Jesus healed the guy. And then Jesus said in John 18:11, "Jesus said to Peter, "Put your sword into its sheath. Shall I not drink the cup that the father has given me?" Well, who crucified Jesus Christ? Oh, it was the father's plan. The Father gave him the cup to drink. What was the cup? Is the cup of suffering and the wrath of God. But then in Acts 2 after the day on the day of Pentecost when Peter gets up and he preaches the first evangelistic sermon, 3000 people got saved. But this is what Peter preached. He said, "Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it." And then later in the text it says that the people heard this and they recognized their responsibility. They were cut to the heart and they say, "What do we do?" And Peter said, "Repent and believe in Jesus Christ. There's no question about the responsibility of wicked men who put our Lord to death." They're responsible for their actions, but it's simultaneously true that God predetermined that this wickedness should take place. So God's providence is over everything, even over evil, and he has the power to turn the greatest evil into the greatest good. How do we know this? Well, because what was the greatest evil in the history of the universe? The greatest evil was wicked men putting the son of God to death. And then that greatest evil God transformed into the greatest good through the resurrection of our Lord so that anyone who trusts in the Lord will be saved and preserved and given life, just like the good that came out of the evil of Joseph's brothers selling him was the preservation of God's people. Third is a promise believed. This is Genesis 50 verse 22. "So Joseph remained in the Egypt, he and his father's house. Joseph lived 110 years." Now, this is important because between verses 21 and 22, 54 years intervene of the brothers living together. They all remained in the Egypt, he and his father's house.And again, the emphasis is on the whole family. They've been healed, they've been united, they're living in shalom. They're living in complete reconciliation. Why is this important? Because of so many brothers and family members that couldn't get along in the Book of Genesis. Adam and Eve's children, Cain and Abel, couldn't get along, couldn't get reconciled, and Cain kills his brother Abel. Abraham has two sons, Ishmael and Isaac, who did not dwell together. Isaac has two sons, Esau and Jacob, and they parted forever. So the book of beginnings ends with Jacob's 12 sons, who are mired in conflict, in a personal relational conflict, and now they're living together in unity. There's no disunity, there's no division, there's no dissension. They've forgiven one another. They saw healing and now they're loving one another and loving neighbor as self. Psalm 1:33 says, "Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity. It is like the precious oil on the head, running down on the beard, on the beard of Aaron, running down on the collar of his robes. It is like the do of Hermon, which falls on the mountains of Zion. For there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore." We know what it means to not get along with others, to be at odds with others, even with Christians. Especially Christians, dare I say. We've sinned against others and others have sinned against us. And that's why it was so important, at the Last Supper, Jesus Christ, this is his final charge to his disciples before the crucifixion. What does he do? He gets on his knees, he takes a basin on water, he takes a towel, and he starts washing the feet of his disciples. What is he doing? He's saying, this is love. Love is getting on your knees and washing the filth of your brothers. Recognize there is filth and recognizing that it needs to be cleansed and recognizing there needs to be humility for this to happen. For true love and true community and true spiritual family to be established. And then he says the following in John 13:34, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." Jesus is saying, this is how important love in the Christian community is. The watching world wants to know, do you believe? Do you truly believe what you say you believe? Do you truly believe in grace? Do you truly believe that your sins are forgiven? Is your heart transformed, so now you forgive one another? This is the greatest apologetic. The world sees this. The world is moved by this. Because there's nothing outside of the Christian Church that comes even close to this kind of community. And that's why this is the greatest point of attack of Satan. If Jesus is saying that unity is the greatest apologetic to the watching world, when brothers and sisters love each other in the church, what's Satan want to do? He wants to kill that apologetic, he wants to kill that testimony, by causing disunity in the church. And we are to be reminded that the blood of Jesus Christ, which unites us, has a unifying power that is stronger than anything that will pull us away from God or pull us away from another. And I say that because there are seasons in life where our love for one another is put to the test. I don't like watching the news. It's all terrible. I've unplugged from the matrix. I'm not on social media. And I'm hearing rumors of another lockdown coming. I don't know, rumors. When I heard that recently, it just took me a flashback back to 2020 and 2021 and the strife within the church. And I just want to say to you, dear church, just recognize that the unifying power of the blood of Christ, which washes us from all sins, which recognizes that we are all degenerate and we're all disgusting before God, we're all depraved in our sin. We are all wrong somewhere. And just putting down our own ambition, our selfish ambition and saying, you know what? My love for my brothers and sisters is a bond that is greater than anything else that could divide us. And the watching world, I'm telling, the watching world finds that incredibly meaningful and powerful. In Genesis 50 verse 23, "And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation. The children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh were counted as Joseph's own. " The age to which Joseph attain shows us how the span of human life was slowly shortening. Isaac lived 180 years, Jacob, 147, and Joseph here 110. Perhaps it's the hardness of life. Perhaps something was already changing because of sin in the world, changing in the environment. But during these years, he was blessed with seeing his grandchildren. In verse 24, "Joseph said to his brothers, "I'm about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of the land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob." And then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, "God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here. So Joseph died, being 110 years old. They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin In Egypt." I die, but God will visit. Joseph doesn't expect his brothers to bring him, as soon as he dies, to bring his coffin or his sarcophagus back to the land of Canaan, most likely because he realized that the political circumstances have changed. When Jacob died, Joseph was in a position of influence to bring him out. And by the end of Joseph's life, Israel doesn't have the same influence in the court of Egypt. He was put in a coffin in Egypt. This is how the Book of Genesis ends. The book opens with life and it ends with death. It opens with a garden and ends with a coffin. Why? Because of sin. Sin entered the world. And as the decades and centuries wore on, the became heavier and the mummy case must have begun to symbolize the futility of the hope. Joseph promised us that we will leave. Abraham was told that we will leave the captivity and land of Egypt, and there he lay for over 300 years until the last day finally when his hope and confidence long deferred was vindicated. The God who makes promises, fulfills his promises. And scripture says that Moses, as he's leading the people of Israel out of Egypt, he remembered the words of Joseph and they carried out his coffin. And then actually for 40 years, the coffin accompanied the people of Israel wherever they went until finally in the days of Joshua, the bones of Joseph were buried in Shechem. Each of the testaments, the Old Testament and the New Testament, ends in hope, with reference to the future. The Old Testament ends with the hope of the Messiah coming, the king of kings, the one that will save, the one that will redeem. The New Testament begins with the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the king of kings, and the New Testament ends with the second coming of the Messiah.  Scripture speaks of the death of a believer as sleep. When a person sleeps, they are alive, they're resting, and they expect to wake up. But scripture doesn't teach soul sleep, it teaches body sleep. The body is in place, wherever it's buried or cremated, and the spirit goes to be with the Lord. So the person is alive, resting from his labors, awaiting and awakening. Body left here, soul in the presence of God. And then those who sleep will be awakened, that's their bodies being resurrected with Christ in a glorified sense. Perfect bodies that will not die. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 comments on this, "But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this, we declare to you by the word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not proceed those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words." So the body shall be raised from the dead. It shall be made like the Lord Jesus Christ's own glorious body, and shall rejoin the spirit in the resurrection. How can we be sure of this? How can we be sure that there is a resurrection? How can we be sure that our bodies will be resurrected and we will spend eternity with God? Well, we can be sure of this because we have no idea where Jesus Christ's body is now. Actually we do. It's not buried here. If Jesus Christ's glorified body is in heaven, now see it the right hand of God. And this is profound. If you study any other world religion, you realize that the followers of that world, they know where the founders are buried. They know where the body is. Just like Abraham and Jacob, they wanted their descendants to know where the bodies are so that they will be remembered. Jesus didn't leave his body. And this is the beauty of Christianity. And this is one of the great proofs for the resurrection of Jesus Christ. If Jesus truly remained dead, then his followers would do everything possible to know where his body was buried to revere him. No, thankfully we don't have Jesus' bones. We have an empty tomb. The tomb is empty. And I love the fact that the tomb of Jesus Christ was where? What was the location of the tomb? It was in a garden. I love how God does that. Genesis begins with a garden and it ends with a tomb. And then when Jesus Christ comes, he fights Satan in the garden Gethsemane, where he's tempted to not take the cup of God's wrath. And then he finally says to the Lord, "Father, not my will but yours be done." And then he goes in the arduous journey of the cross and the Via Dolorosa and he takes the cross upon himself and on the cross he takes our sins upon himself. He suffered. He was crucified. And he was buried in a tomb, in a garden. And God is saying that there's a place of death, but it's a place of resurrection and it's in a garden.And I love when Mary goes to see Jesus on the resurrection Sunday. She sees him, but she mistakens him for what? She mistakens him for whom? She mistakens him for a gardener. I love that. I love that. A resurrected Jesus, he's mistaken for a gardener. Why? What's he doing? I don't know. He's probably weeding the garden around the tomb and he's like, oh, no one's taking care of this place. But it's a sign to us that God, through his resurrection of his son, that's the validation. That's the proof that we too by faith in Christ will be resurrected. Jesus Christ says to the disciples, "I go and I prepare a place for you, a truly Promised Land for you," in John 14. And he says, "Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I'm going. Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes through the Father except through me." This is an implacable truth of the universe, that the only way we can go to God, be reconciled with God, is through Jesus Christ. He is the way, he is the truth, and he is life itself. Joseph looked to the exodus. He looked forward to the exodus. And why was that important? Because the people of God were redeemed out of captivity and they were saved from the angel of death because of the blood of the Passover lamb. On the night before they were redeemed and brought out of the exodus, they took a lamb and they slew the lamb, and then by faith they painted the blood of the slain lamb over their door and were delivered from death and then from Egypt. And all of this was to point to Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God. Jesus Christ is the one that leads us out in the new Exodus. 1 Corinthians 5:7 says, "For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed." So the people of Israel, they had to act upon their faith. Do we believe the words of God when he says that you have to kill a lamb and you have to paint your doorway with the blood? Do we believe it? Then you have to act on it. We have to do it. And then they were saved. In the same way, how can we be redeemed from our sin through the blood of the lamb of God? You have to believe it, and then you have to act upon it. How do we act upon it? We repent of our sin. Lord, we have transgressed. We have committed evil. We have committed sins. Lord, that sin, that evil, the penalty for all of that was laid upon you. That's why you were slain. So we believe and then we reorder our life around that belief. Bible trivia question, did Moses ever see the Promised Land? Oh, look at you good Bible scholars. God prevented him from seeing the Promised Land because of his stubbornness and sin. But then on the Mount of Transfiguration in Luke 9, it says, "Moses met with Jesus." Where? In the Promised Land. And what do they talk about? Luke 9:28, "Now about eight days after these sayings he took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered, and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish in Jerusalem." And the word for departure in the original is Exodus. What did Moses want to talk about with Jesus? He wanted to talk about the Exodus. Moses, the great Moses who led the people of God in the exodus through the Red Sea that was parted, wanted to talk with Jesus Christ about the new exodus that was going to be accomplished in Jerusalem where on the cross, that we are led from the captivity to our sin. From condemnation for our sin, we're led through the Red Sea of the blood of Jesus Christ that was poured down on the cross and by grace through faith. When we repent of sin, the Lord forgives us and he frees us. Praise be to God. And as we await in faith and hope of our exodus to the Promised Land, we too, by God's grace, are reminded from this text that we are to seek to live in harmony and peace with one another, forgiving and being forgiven. Matthew 6:14, Jesus says some incredible things. He says, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." It's incredible because he's saying, this is how fundamental forgiveness is in the Christian life. If you truly believe that you have been forgiven by God, a holy God, an eternal weight of penalty, well, how will you not then forgive those who sin against you? Matthew 18, it says that Peter came to Jesus and he said to him, and I'll close with this because these are some weighty words. He said, "Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times? And Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times." Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. And since he could not pay, his master awarded him to be sold with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, "Have patience with me and, I will pay you everything." And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him saying, "Pay what you owe." So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, "Have patience with me, and I will pay you. He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. And when his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. Then his master summoned him and said to him, "You wicked servant. I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you? And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart." If you truly understand how much you have been forgiven by God at the cross, how could you withhold forgiveness from another? So meditate on the words of Christ from the cross. Father, forgive them, for they do not what they do. Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for a blessed time in the Holy Scriptures and the Book of Genesis, the book of beginnings. Lord, we thank you that because of your son Jesus Christ, we have access to grace. And Lord, I pray that we never take your grace for granted. And as we receive your grace, I pray it transforms us to be a people who are quick to forgive when others sin against us. And Lord, continue to bless this church, continue to unify our hearts, to bring us into cohesion around your will for us. And we do pray that as we love one another, because you have first loved us, the watching world will be mesmerized. How is it that these people truly love one another? And I pray that you give us grace to then deflect all the glory and honor to you and say, it's only because of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, and whose name we pray. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Forgive from the Heart

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 20, 2023 55:09


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic Boston Church. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston, or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your holy scriptures. We thank you for the Book of Genesis, the book of beginnings, we come to the end of it today. A book that begins with a garden and perfect peace, with Adam and Eve walking with you in the cool of the day. It ends with two deaths. It ends with two coffins. And we pray that today you remind us that because of our sin, because of our rebellion, we are sinners by nature and by choice. Death is in the world and death will come to each one of us if the Lord should tarry. And Lord, I pray you make us the people that meditate upon death. As hard as it is, it is an important spiritual discipline to think about. How do we want to be remembered? What kind of legacy do we want to leave? And Lord, we thank you for the gospel of Jesus Christ. We thank you that your son lived the perfect life, walked with you perfectly, never sinned, fulfilled the law of God from the heart. You loved God, and you love neighbor, Jesus, so much so that you offered yourself up on the cross in order to redeem us. And we thank you Jesus that you did not stay dead and we thank you that through your resurrection, you have conquered Satan, sin, and death. And in your death, we see the death of death itself. And make us a people who trust in your word and recognizing that when we believe in you, repent of sin, we are granted eternal life. It's eternal life that begins now and continues through all of eternity. And Lord, we thank you for the lessons that we have learned from the life of Joseph, from the life of Jacob, as we remember their faith and their faithfulness, we also recognize that there were times when they were faithless. And still because they were yours, because they were your elect, you remain faithful to them. And Lord remain faithful to us. We trust in that promise and give us grace. Grace to have our sins forgiven and grace to then extend forgiveness to others when they sin against us. We thank you for the reminder of how important unity is in the church of God and I pray that you unite us, recognizing that the blood of Jesus Christ and the unity that he gives us triumphs over anything that could potentially divide us. We pray that you bless our time, the Holy Scriptures, Holy Spirit, we love you, we welcome you, and we pray that you deepen our love for you as we meditate upon your word. And we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series called Graduate Level Grace, actually ending it today. A study in the life of Joseph. Today we're in Genesis 50. Next Sunday is our annual vision sermon. So if you are looking for a church, if you are church shopping, definitely come back next week and we, by the power of God, hopefully will show you of the importance of a gospel proclaiming church, a faithful church in a place like Boston. And then after that, we will start a brand new sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We're calling it Kingdom Come: The Gospel of Mark and the secret of God's kingdom in which we'll meditate. And what it means is that Jesus is king and what it means that we are part of his kingdom, that we have been transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of his beloved son, and what it means to be kingdom minded. Today the title of the sermon is Forgive from the Heart. The Book of Genesis, the book of beginnings, begins with life. God creates life and he creates humanity and everything is perfect and shalom. And then the Book of Genesis ends with death, two deaths actually, the death of Jacob and the death of Joseph. And you say, what happened? It started in such a promising way and such a promising note and it ends with death. And the answer is sin. The answer is, rebellion and rejection of God's reign and rule ushered in death. And Jacob here we're told is buried in the Promised Land as a testimony to the promises God has made in the past. And Joseph's body is put in a coffin in Egypt as a testimony to the fact that he believed that God would bring his promises to pass in the future via the Exodus. And both these godly men die in the Lord, which is a great blessing. Revelation 14:13 says, "And I heard a voice from heaven saying, "Write this. Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on." "Blessed indeed," says the spirit, "that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them." Blessed is to die in the Lord. To die as a believer. Blessed is to die well and to have your funeral be a celebration of your life. Blessed it is to live in such a way where people do want to come to your funeral, and people do have many a good thing, a blessed thing to say about your life. My wife and I, we took a vacation, a trip last summer to Vail, Colorado. And my goodness, it was incredible. Vail is so beautiful. And we're sitting on the porch outside of the hotel room and we have this incredible mountain view and everything's perfect, the food was perfect, the views were perfect, everything's perfect. And when everything's perfect, the Slavic in us, we come from a Slavic background, the Slavic in us wants to be reminded that there is pain in the world. And we decided it would be wise to partake in one of the most painful exercises you could possibly partake. And my wife asked me, she said, "And when I die, what will you say at my funeral?" And then I was like, hold on, I got to think about it. And then as I'm thinking about it, I'm like, okay, what would I say? Many a good thing. I'm going to save it till her funeral. And then I said, "What are you going to say about me at my funeral?" And it was so beautiful and so heart-wrenching, heartwarming, we're just weeping. We're just sitting here and beautiful, weeping. But it was a wonderful reminder of the fact that we will die. And then if you reverse engineer how you want to live in order to be remembered in a positive way, well, how should you live? And I've done many a funeral and I will tell you it's a world of difference when the person that dies dies in the Lord, than a person that had nothing to do with God or there was no evidence of faith in God. People kind of say the same stuff, but you know it comes from a different place when the person was truly a believer secure in the hands of God. What do people say at funerals? Well, the person is now in a better place. If you're a believer or not, everyone says the same thing, even at an unbeliever's funeral. No one wants to say, "Yeah, this person was a pagan and wicked had nothing to do with God." No, they say, "They're in better place." Well, we are to prepare in life for death in order for those words to be true. In the Book of Numbers, Balaam was hired by Balak to curse Israel, but he ends up blessing them, and this is what he says in Numbers 23:10, "Who can count the dust of Jacob or number the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the upright, and let my end be like his." Let me die the death of the upright. In chapter 48, we saw Jacob's greatest act of faith, as singled out in the Hall of Faith Hebrews 11, when he blessed the sons of Joseph, when he crossed his hands, which is an incredible example and actually prophecy of the cross of Jesus Christ. But in Hebrews 11:22 in the Hall of Faith, it says that what Joseph does in this chapter was Joseph's greatest act of faith. Hebrews 11:22 says, "By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones." Joseph, on his deathbed, spoke of the exodus, of the promises of God concerning the exodus, and he demanded to be buried back in the land of Canaan, although he realized it's going to be centuries before the people of God are led out of Egypt. From all appearances, Joseph had at this time by the end of his life, already been an Egyptian through and through. He was an Egyptian from the day of his captivity when he was 17 to when he was elevated to prominence in the Egyptian court at age 30 and he married an Egyptian woman, followed Egyptian laws, carried an Egyptian name. But his dying words show that he had been a stranger in the midst of it all. His citizenship was not in Egypt, it was in heaven. Though he ruled in Egypt, Egypt did not rule in him. He was in the world, but he was not of the world. No worldly influence or power or authority or success distracted him from his faith in God. And as truly as his fathers who would dwell in tents, he too felt like he had no continuing city here. He continued to believe in God and his promises, and he continued to look by faith into the future. Before we look at Genesis 50, just one verse right before to set the context. Jacob on his deathbed blessed his sons, and then Genesis 48:33, it says, "When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and he was gathered to his people." Jacob's body was still in the room, but his soul was gathered to the people of God and he was reunited with his fathers. As Jesus said, "Before Abraham was, I am." And then the Pharisees were like, what are you talking about? That's blasphemy. And he said, "Have you not read? God says I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God is not the God of the dead but of the living." Three points to frame up our time as we walk through the text, a father celebrated, a family reconciled, and a promise believed. So first of Father celebrated. Genesis 50 verse one. "Then Joseph fell on his father's face and wept over him and kissed him. And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. Forty days were required for it, for that is how many are required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him for seventy days" Before Jacob took the trek to Egypt with all of his family, he asked God, "God, are you going with me?" And God met him and said, "Fear not. I will go with you and I will bless you. And your son Joseph is going to close your eyes in death." The other brothers were certainly present at the deathbed of Jacob and they too grieved the death of his father. But Joseph's grief is highlighted here. His love for his father is highlighted here. His affection for his father. He's weeping over him. Why? Because first of all, he stood closer to his father than the other brothers. And also he is experiencing a pain accentuated by the fact that he had lost years of relationship with his father. There's grief, but then there's restrained, godly grief. Joseph is weeping, and after he is done weeping, he then goes into action. Why? Because his grief is like that of a believer. We grieve but not like those without hope. Joseph knows that he too will go to be with his father in the presence of God, just like Jacob did. Joseph here is 56 years of age when his father Jacob died. If you remember, he was 17 when he was sold into captivity by his brothers. And then he was 30 when he rose to prominence in power and in Pharaoh's Court. And then there were seven years of plenty and then two years of famine. And at age 39, his family moved to Goshen. And then Jacob spent 17 years, the last 17 years of his life, with Joseph, just like Joseph had spent the first 17 years of his life with his father. It says that the Egyptians wept for Jacob for 70 days. And this is really important because the Egyptians wept for Pharaoh. When a pharaoh would die, the king of Israel, the Egyptians would weep 72 days. So here we have a feeble shepherd who was revered almost as highly as royalty. Why? Because of his son. Because his son saved the people. And the people recognize that apart from Joseph and his wisdom that God gave him, they would've ended up dead. And sometimes fathers provide for their children early on and sometimes children ended up providing for their parents. I tell my girls this, I have four daughters. I remember when my oldest for the very first time, she was like nine, she washed my car. And I was so pumped and I was like finally, a little ROI. A little return on investment. But we do. We pour into our kids and as we raise the children and recognize the children by God's grace will care for us in our old age. There is no burial recorded in scripture quite as honorable as this with such a wealth of detail. And Joseph commands the physicians, it says, to embalm his father. Not the mortuary priests. His wife was part of the priest cast in Egypt, but it's not the priest that come in and do the embalming. No, it's the doctors, the physicians. Why does Joseph do this? First of all, he wants everyone to know we're not doing this for religious purposes. There's a practical purpose here. The practical purpose in embalming Jacob is to transport his body into Canaan, the Promised Land, just like Jacob had commanded Joseph and the son. So the pagan embalming procedure is used by the Lord God here. So Jacob and Joseph are the only two Israelites of whom the scriptures tell that they were embalmed, not for religious value, but strictly for feasible transportation. Genesis 50 verse 4, "And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, "If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, "My father made me swear, saying, "I'm about to die: in my tomb that I hewed out for myself in the land of Canaan, there shall you bury me." Now therefore, let me please go up and bury my father. Then I will return. And Pharaoh answered, Go up, and bury your father, as he made you swear." Joseph being the wise administrator that he is, he understands how the political court works. Although he's second in command to Pharaoh, he understands authority. He understands he's in authority, and he understands he's under authority. So he doesn't want to pull rank. And he understands that Pharaoh would be apprehensive about letting such a trusted official go with his whole tribe, his whole family back to the land of Canaan. Especially given that Joseph knew sensitive information about Egypt and the inner workings, and such clandestine information would be very valuable to the enemies of Egypt. So Joseph understands he needs Pharaoh's clearance, so he asks. Joseph is given his request to go back, and on top of that, he's given a large entourage to escort Jacob for the internment. It's a massive funeral entourage. Hundreds of people made up the retinue. In verse 7 it says, "So Joseph went up to bury his father. With him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household, and all the elders of the land of Egypt, as well as all the household of Joseph, his brothers, and his father's household. Only their children, their flocks, and their herds were left in the land of Goshen. And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company. The text emphasizes that the children, the livestock, were left in Goshen, to emphasize the fact that they felt so secure in leaving the children, the little ones in Goshen. That's how much God had blessed the people of Israel. He'd given them security, he'd given them land. And we see the entourage led by Joseph, and it's almost a mini rehearsal for the ultimate homecoming of the children of Israel out of Egypt via the exodus. And actually the route they took was the same exact one as Israel would take centuries later after the Exodus. In verse 10, "When they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a great and grievous lamentation, and he made a mourning for his father seven days." The Egyptian custom of those days were where when you get to the place of burial, the point of burial, you take another seven days of lamentation. So we're up to 77 days that people lamented the death of Jacob. And this is important. I think this is important for us because we live in a society that idolizes youth and we don't respect people in their older age and we don't think about honoring them and their death. We don't think about honoring them after their death. And this morning my dad, he sent me a text message, iMessage from Estonia, he's in Estonia right now, my country of origin, and he's there with my mom. And he takes a pilgrimage almost every single year. And every time he goes to Estonia, he goes to the cemetery where his mom is buried and where his grandparents are buried. And they take care of their little plot of land, put flowers there. And I remember when I was younger, I was like, that's kind of silly because they're in heaven, right? We believe that they're in heaven, their souls are in heaven. But he's doing it as a way to honor them. Honor their remembrance, and honor their sacrifice for him and for us. And this is important, I think it's important for us to really celebrate those who came before us and to honor them and their death and honor them after their death and the memory of them. And this is what the Lord Jesus told us in the celebration of the last supper. He said, "Do this for what purpose? Do this in remembrance of me." Every time we take the cup and the bread, we're remembering the death of our Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrifice and resurrection. Verse 11 of chapter 50, when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning on the threshing floor of Atad, they said, "This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians," and therefore the place was named Abel-mizraim. Abel-mizraim means mourning of Egypt. Verse 12, "Thus his sons did for him as he had commanded them, for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah to the east of Mamre, which Abraham bought with the field from Efron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone up with him to bury his father." So Jacob's sons take over here in the very final and most intimate part of the service. They are the ones that bury their father. They are the ones that lay him in his final resting place for his body. And the emphasis in the text is his sons, all his sons are unified in that. They obey the commandment of their father. Perhaps for the first time, all 12 of them are unified in obedience of their father. We see them as submissive, dutiful, faithful. They're truly changed men. And then that whole family goes back to Egypt, goes back to Goshen. And now the question is, well, how then will they live? Now that Jacob's influence as the patriarch, as the loving father on all 12 sons. Are they going to live in unity and reconciliation? And the text says yes. Point two is the family reconciled. Verse 15, "When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him." So they sent a message to Joseph saying, "Your father gave this command before he died: Say to Joseph, please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you." And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him. So the brother is realizing their father is dead, understandably they're worried. And they're wondering, was he nice to us just because of dad? He's been benevolent to us, but is the benevolence just a mask for malevolent intent? Was he really just harboring resentment and biding his time? So they sent a message to Joseph. They don't go personally just yet. First they want to test the waters. Who do they send? Most likely they sent the youngest son Benjamin because he was loved by both sides of the family. And when Joseph hears this message, he weeps. Why does he weep? Because if these words are true, that Jacob said this, then he's weeping over the fact that his father Jacob did not trust him, did not trust his intentions, did not trust his words. If it's not true, if Jacob did not say this, then Joseph is weeping over the fact that his brothers still don't trust him. And there was no ground for mistrust. Joseph's forgiveness had been without condition. To have his sincere motives questioned was painful, especially after 17 years of care and provision. And you got to stop and you got to wonder, why would they question Joseph after 17 years of his love toward them and word indeed? Well, most likely they're projecting their own guilt on him. Most likely they haven't dealt completely with their guilt and their sin. And most likely they're thinking, okay, if we were sold into captivity by Joseph, and if we were in power over him, and now that dad's not here to protect him, what would we do? And in their sinfulness, they think, you know what? We would probably make him pay for his sins. And that's why it's so important in this message. They say, "Please forgive the transgression." They use the word transgression. They use the word sin, and they use the word evil. They recognize that they've transgressed, not just against God, but against his brother. They've sinned, not just against God, but against their brother. They've committed evil, not against just God, but his and their brother. And what do they call themselves? Forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father. For the first time the text tells us that they confess allegiance to the God of the universe. He's our God, not just the God of our Father. They repent and Joseph is weeping. So they got the message that Joseph is weeping. In verse 18 it says, "His brothers also came and they fell down before him and said, "Behold, we are your servants." But Joseph said to them, "Do not fear for am I in the place of God. As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones." Thus he comforted them and he spoke kindly to them. Their sorrow and their repentance is genuine. It's sincere. That's why they come on the heels of the messenger and they offer themselves to Joseph as slaves. And we got to pause and just say it's incredible how God worked in this family, how he's been growing this family. We see spiritual growth and maturity. We see the brothers humble themselves before their younger brother, a sibling they once hated. And they confess their sin and wrongdoing and they prostrate themselves before their brother just as Joseph once dreamed. Why is this emphasized in the last chapter of the book? Well, because finally this family is healed. Finally, this family is united. Finally, this family understands the grace of God. I don't know about your family situation, your family of origin, your current family. But I will tell you this, that apart from grace, you cannot have a true united loving relationship that's going to last the test of time. We need grace. Why? Because we're all sinners and we sin against one another. The forgiveness of Joseph gives is a full forgiveness, and it reminds us of the forgiveness of Joseph's antitype, the greater Joseph, which is the Lord Jesus Christ. And we can be assured of this, that when we repent of our sins and trust in Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven completely. The forgiveness is permanent. And we are forgiven for the penalty of our sins forever. For those who are in Christ Jesus, there is no condemnation. And when the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross and he bore the sins of sinners, he satisfied the divine justice for those for whom he died. Consequently, heaven can bring no new charges against those for whom the Lord has paid a full debt. God does not require the debt to be paid twice. The saved are safe and secure thanks to the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. But there are seasons when we doubt this, are there not? Are there seasons in your life, dear believer, when you wonder, did Jesus completely forgive me? Am I truly secure in the hands of God? Or have I lost my relationship with God? And those seasons, for the true believer, those seasons are helpful, because those seasons cause us to wonder, why? Why do I have these doubts? The scriptures are clear that those who believe in Jesus Christ have eternal life immediately. It begins now and continues through return. Most likely we have those doubts because there's current sin in our lives. And then we've got to pause and say, what do I do? Well, you've got to repent of that sin and turn from it and turn back to the Lord. Go back to the cross of Jesus Christ. And we through our life of obedience of faith are to confirm that our election is true. And Joseph says, "Do not fear for am I in the place of God." Do I have the right to judge you? I'm not God over you. I have the power to judge you, but I don't have the right to judge you. And he reminds them that God is the ultimate judge and all wrongs are to be righted by him. Friend, when you are wronged by someone, what is the first inclination of your heart? Most likely it's to seek vengeance. And the Lord says, "No, no, no. When you're sinned against, remember vengeance is mine. I will repay," said the Lord. 1 Thessalonians 5:15," See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. "Joseph continues says, "As for you, you meant evil against me. But God meant it for good." And here we have a classic statement on the doctrine of providence and specifically God's concurrence. And that doctrine means that God can override, he chooses to override the evil consequences of the wicked to bring about a blessing. And the holy God overrides our sin while simultaneously remaining unsullied by it. One commentator says that God handles sin sinlessly. What could I do to interfere with God's plan even if I desire to do so is Joseph's sentiment. God is the ultimate governor of the universe. And it was the similar sentiment of Joseph back in chapter 45 when the brothers started the process of reconciliation in Genesis 45:5. "And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and the ruler over all the land of Egypt." You sold me, but it was God who sent me. God is a holy God, he's not the author of evil. He's holy, and therefore no holiness proceeds from him. But God does determine that evil exists in the universe in order to accomplish a greater good that would exist if he had not determined that evil should exist. Why? To manifest His glory through justice and grace, god determines that sin exists in the universe. And to really grasp this, it's important to meditate on the question, who crucified Jesus Christ? Who crucified our Lord and Savior? If you look at John 18 where Jesus is in the garden in Gethsemane, he told his disciples to pray, stay awake, be watchful. The flesh is weak but the spirit is strong. And the disciples fall asleep and then the soldiers are there. And then Judas points out who Jesus is. And Peter out of nowhere is awakened. And then Peter takes out a sword and he attempts to cut off the head of one of the servants that came. And he was still asleep, a little groggy. He missed the head and only nipped the ear. And then Jesus healed the guy. And then Jesus said in John 18:11, "Jesus said to Peter, "Put your sword into its sheath. Shall I not drink the cup that the father has given me?" Well, who crucified Jesus Christ? Oh, it was the father's plan. The Father gave him the cup to drink. What was the cup? Is the cup of suffering and the wrath of God. But then in Acts 2 after the day on the day of Pentecost when Peter gets up and he preaches the first evangelistic sermon, 3000 people got saved. But this is what Peter preached. He said, "Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it." And then later in the text it says that the people heard this and they recognized their responsibility. They were cut to the heart and they say, "What do we do?" And Peter said, "Repent and believe in Jesus Christ. There's no question about the responsibility of wicked men who put our Lord to death." They're responsible for their actions, but it's simultaneously true that God predetermined that this wickedness should take place. So God's providence is over everything, even over evil, and he has the power to turn the greatest evil into the greatest good. How do we know this? Well, because what was the greatest evil in the history of the universe? The greatest evil was wicked men putting the son of God to death. And then that greatest evil God transformed into the greatest good through the resurrection of our Lord so that anyone who trusts in the Lord will be saved and preserved and given life, just like the good that came out of the evil of Joseph's brothers selling him was the preservation of God's people. Third is a promise believed. This is Genesis 50 verse 22. "So Joseph remained in the Egypt, he and his father's house. Joseph lived 110 years." Now, this is important because between verses 21 and 22, 54 years intervene of the brothers living together. They all remained in the Egypt, he and his father's house.And again, the emphasis is on the whole family. They've been healed, they've been united, they're living in shalom. They're living in complete reconciliation. Why is this important? Because of so many brothers and family members that couldn't get along in the Book of Genesis. Adam and Eve's children, Cain and Abel, couldn't get along, couldn't get reconciled, and Cain kills his brother Abel. Abraham has two sons, Ishmael and Isaac, who did not dwell together. Isaac has two sons, Esau and Jacob, and they parted forever. So the book of beginnings ends with Jacob's 12 sons, who are mired in conflict, in a personal relational conflict, and now they're living together in unity. There's no disunity, there's no division, there's no dissension. They've forgiven one another. They saw healing and now they're loving one another and loving neighbor as self. Psalm 1:33 says, "Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity. It is like the precious oil on the head, running down on the beard, on the beard of Aaron, running down on the collar of his robes. It is like the do of Hermon, which falls on the mountains of Zion. For there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore." We know what it means to not get along with others, to be at odds with others, even with Christians. Especially Christians, dare I say. We've sinned against others and others have sinned against us. And that's why it was so important, at the Last Supper, Jesus Christ, this is his final charge to his disciples before the crucifixion. What does he do? He gets on his knees, he takes a basin on water, he takes a towel, and he starts washing the feet of his disciples. What is he doing? He's saying, this is love. Love is getting on your knees and washing the filth of your brothers. Recognize there is filth and recognizing that it needs to be cleansed and recognizing there needs to be humility for this to happen. For true love and true community and true spiritual family to be established. And then he says the following in John 13:34, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." Jesus is saying, this is how important love in the Christian community is. The watching world wants to know, do you believe? Do you truly believe what you say you believe? Do you truly believe in grace? Do you truly believe that your sins are forgiven? Is your heart transformed, so now you forgive one another? This is the greatest apologetic. The world sees this. The world is moved by this. Because there's nothing outside of the Christian Church that comes even close to this kind of community. And that's why this is the greatest point of attack of Satan. If Jesus is saying that unity is the greatest apologetic to the watching world, when brothers and sisters love each other in the church, what's Satan want to do? He wants to kill that apologetic, he wants to kill that testimony, by causing disunity in the church. And we are to be reminded that the blood of Jesus Christ, which unites us, has a unifying power that is stronger than anything that will pull us away from God or pull us away from another. And I say that because there are seasons in life where our love for one another is put to the test. I don't like watching the news. It's all terrible. I've unplugged from the matrix. I'm not on social media. And I'm hearing rumors of another lockdown coming. I don't know, rumors. When I heard that recently, it just took me a flashback back to 2020 and 2021 and the strife within the church. And I just want to say to you, dear church, just recognize that the unifying power of the blood of Christ, which washes us from all sins, which recognizes that we are all degenerate and we're all disgusting before God, we're all depraved in our sin. We are all wrong somewhere. And just putting down our own ambition, our selfish ambition and saying, you know what? My love for my brothers and sisters is a bond that is greater than anything else that could divide us. And the watching world, I'm telling, the watching world finds that incredibly meaningful and powerful. In Genesis 50 verse 23, "And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation. The children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh were counted as Joseph's own. " The age to which Joseph attain shows us how the span of human life was slowly shortening. Isaac lived 180 years, Jacob, 147, and Joseph here 110. Perhaps it's the hardness of life. Perhaps something was already changing because of sin in the world, changing in the environment. But during these years, he was blessed with seeing his grandchildren. In verse 24, "Joseph said to his brothers, "I'm about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of the land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob." And then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, "God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here. So Joseph died, being 110 years old. They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin In Egypt." I die, but God will visit. Joseph doesn't expect his brothers to bring him, as soon as he dies, to bring his coffin or his sarcophagus back to the land of Canaan, most likely because he realized that the political circumstances have changed. When Jacob died, Joseph was in a position of influence to bring him out. And by the end of Joseph's life, Israel doesn't have the same influence in the court of Egypt. He was put in a coffin in Egypt. This is how the Book of Genesis ends. The book opens with life and it ends with death. It opens with a garden and ends with a coffin. Why? Because of sin. Sin entered the world. And as the decades and centuries wore on, the became heavier and the mummy case must have begun to symbolize the futility of the hope. Joseph promised us that we will leave. Abraham was told that we will leave the captivity and land of Egypt, and there he lay for over 300 years until the last day finally when his hope and confidence long deferred was vindicated. The God who makes promises, fulfills his promises. And scripture says that Moses, as he's leading the people of Israel out of Egypt, he remembered the words of Joseph and they carried out his coffin. And then actually for 40 years, the coffin accompanied the people of Israel wherever they went until finally in the days of Joshua, the bones of Joseph were buried in Shechem. Each of the testaments, the Old Testament and the New Testament, ends in hope, with reference to the future. The Old Testament ends with the hope of the Messiah coming, the king of kings, the one that will save, the one that will redeem. The New Testament begins with the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the king of kings, and the New Testament ends with the second coming of the Messiah.  Scripture speaks of the death of a believer as sleep. When a person sleeps, they are alive, they're resting, and they expect to wake up. But scripture doesn't teach soul sleep, it teaches body sleep. The body is in place, wherever it's buried or cremated, and the spirit goes to be with the Lord. So the person is alive, resting from his labors, awaiting and awakening. Body left here, soul in the presence of God. And then those who sleep will be awakened, that's their bodies being resurrected with Christ in a glorified sense. Perfect bodies that will not die. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 comments on this, "But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this, we declare to you by the word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not proceed those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words." So the body shall be raised from the dead. It shall be made like the Lord Jesus Christ's own glorious body, and shall rejoin the spirit in the resurrection. How can we be sure of this? How can we be sure that there is a resurrection? How can we be sure that our bodies will be resurrected and we will spend eternity with God? Well, we can be sure of this because we have no idea where Jesus Christ's body is now. Actually we do. It's not buried here. If Jesus Christ's glorified body is in heaven, now see it the right hand of God. And this is profound. If you study any other world religion, you realize that the followers of that world, they know where the founders are buried. They know where the body is. Just like Abraham and Jacob, they wanted their descendants to know where the bodies are so that they will be remembered. Jesus didn't leave his body. And this is the beauty of Christianity. And this is one of the great proofs for the resurrection of Jesus Christ. If Jesus truly remained dead, then his followers would do everything possible to know where his body was buried to revere him. No, thankfully we don't have Jesus' bones. We have an empty tomb. The tomb is empty. And I love the fact that the tomb of Jesus Christ was where? What was the location of the tomb? It was in a garden. I love how God does that. Genesis begins with a garden and it ends with a tomb. And then when Jesus Christ comes, he fights Satan in the garden Gethsemane, where he's tempted to not take the cup of God's wrath. And then he finally says to the Lord, "Father, not my will but yours be done." And then he goes in the arduous journey of the cross and the Via Dolorosa and he takes the cross upon himself and on the cross he takes our sins upon himself. He suffered. He was crucified. And he was buried in a tomb, in a garden. And God is saying that there's a place of death, but it's a place of resurrection and it's in a garden.And I love when Mary goes to see Jesus on the resurrection Sunday. She sees him, but she mistakens him for what? She mistakens him for whom? She mistakens him for a gardener. I love that. I love that. A resurrected Jesus, he's mistaken for a gardener. Why? What's he doing? I don't know. He's probably weeding the garden around the tomb and he's like, oh, no one's taking care of this place. But it's a sign to us that God, through his resurrection of his son, that's the validation. That's the proof that we too by faith in Christ will be resurrected. Jesus Christ says to the disciples, "I go and I prepare a place for you, a truly Promised Land for you," in John 14. And he says, "Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I'm going. Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes through the Father except through me." This is an implacable truth of the universe, that the only way we can go to God, be reconciled with God, is through Jesus Christ. He is the way, he is the truth, and he is life itself. Joseph looked to the exodus. He looked forward to the exodus. And why was that important? Because the people of God were redeemed out of captivity and they were saved from the angel of death because of the blood of the Passover lamb. On the night before they were redeemed and brought out of the exodus, they took a lamb and they slew the lamb, and then by faith they painted the blood of the slain lamb over their door and were delivered from death and then from Egypt. And all of this was to point to Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God. Jesus Christ is the one that leads us out in the new Exodus. 1 Corinthians 5:7 says, "For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed." So the people of Israel, they had to act upon their faith. Do we believe the words of God when he says that you have to kill a lamb and you have to paint your doorway with the blood? Do we believe it? Then you have to act on it. We have to do it. And then they were saved. In the same way, how can we be redeemed from our sin through the blood of the lamb of God? You have to believe it, and then you have to act upon it. How do we act upon it? We repent of our sin. Lord, we have transgressed. We have committed evil. We have committed sins. Lord, that sin, that evil, the penalty for all of that was laid upon you. That's why you were slain. So we believe and then we reorder our life around that belief. Bible trivia question, did Moses ever see the Promised Land? Oh, look at you good Bible scholars. God prevented him from seeing the Promised Land because of his stubbornness and sin. But then on the Mount of Transfiguration in Luke 9, it says, "Moses met with Jesus." Where? In the Promised Land. And what do they talk about? Luke 9:28, "Now about eight days after these sayings he took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered, and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish in Jerusalem." And the word for departure in the original is Exodus. What did Moses want to talk about with Jesus? He wanted to talk about the Exodus. Moses, the great Moses who led the people of God in the exodus through the Red Sea that was parted, wanted to talk with Jesus Christ about the new exodus that was going to be accomplished in Jerusalem where on the cross, that we are led from the captivity to our sin. From condemnation for our sin, we're led through the Red Sea of the blood of Jesus Christ that was poured down on the cross and by grace through faith. When we repent of sin, the Lord forgives us and he frees us. Praise be to God. And as we await in faith and hope of our exodus to the Promised Land, we too, by God's grace, are reminded from this text that we are to seek to live in harmony and peace with one another, forgiving and being forgiven. Matthew 6:14, Jesus says some incredible things. He says, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." It's incredible because he's saying, this is how fundamental forgiveness is in the Christian life. If you truly believe that you have been forgiven by God, a holy God, an eternal weight of penalty, well, how will you not then forgive those who sin against you? Matthew 18, it says that Peter came to Jesus and he said to him, and I'll close with this because these are some weighty words. He said, "Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times? And Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times." Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. And since he could not pay, his master awarded him to be sold with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, "Have patience with me and, I will pay you everything." And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him saying, "Pay what you owe." So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, "Have patience with me, and I will pay you. He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. And when his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. Then his master summoned him and said to him, "You wicked servant. I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you? And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart." If you truly understand how much you have been forgiven by God at the cross, how could you withhold forgiveness from another? So meditate on the words of Christ from the cross. Father, forgive them, for they do not what they do. Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for a blessed time in the Holy Scriptures and the Book of Genesis, the book of beginnings. Lord, we thank you that because of your son Jesus Christ, we have access to grace. And Lord, I pray that we never take your grace for granted. And as we receive your grace, I pray it transforms us to be a people who are quick to forgive when others sin against us. And Lord, continue to bless this church, continue to unify our hearts, to bring us into cohesion around your will for us. And we do pray that as we love one another, because you have first loved us, the watching world will be mesmerized. How is it that these people truly love one another? And I pray that you give us grace to then deflect all the glory and honor to you and say, it's only because of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, and whose name we pray. Amen.

The Debbie Nigro Show
NBC Universal Studio Exec. Shares How To Build Professional Relationships

The Debbie Nigro Show

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 10, 2023 13:42


Michael Swanson Sr. VP Production NBC Universal Studio Group, was just featured in the Forbes Magazine article called, ‘How To Build Your Network” by Maya Richard-Craven.   Michael who's a giver by nature, was called on for his expert advice. He shared that ‘helping other people is a great way to form long- term relationships”.  When it comes to creating professional relationships, Michael says, “Go out of your way to be of service with a genuine motive and an earnest heart”. “Then over time, someone may ask if there is anything you need."  Since 85% of jobs are filled through networking rather than traditional hiring, (yes, it's true), then Michael's advice should help lead you in the right direction to build your career.  Michael's own professional journey has been one of working his way up through hard work, and is filled with many accomplishments. Being of service to many along his jounrey has surely led to the many professional relationships he has come to enjoy. Besides being an Emmy Award winner, and a Hollywood TV studio executive, film producer and theatre producer, Michael is also a visionary entrepreneur and President and CEO of the entertainment company, Faith Filmworks.  At NBC Universal, he's the studio executive responsible for the production of Universal Television's Parks and Recreation, Hacks, The Good Place, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Good Girls, Never Have I Ever, Community and Master of None. And throughout his distinguished career in entertainment, Michael has produced movies to critical and audience acclaim including All About You, All About Us, For the Love of Ruth, To Hell and Back, Andraé Crouch: Making The Journey, Two Seasons, Notre Dame First Time Fans: Legacy, The Wayman Tisdale Story and Fannie. He's a guy many in the professional entertinament business aspire to meet, but if you do meet him, please don't ask if he has a card! Or a QR Code! LOL Michael said, " I find that a little off-putting. I think it's more important to really engage a person and get to know him or her, ask questions, but in a very genuine and authentic way as opposed to kind of bouncing around collecting information and calculating in your head what's the best way he or she can help boost my career or advance my career so I can climb the ladder. Frankly in my opinion it's just the opposite. How can we be of service to others? I find that when you are in service to others in a genuine way, with an authentic heart and no ulterior motives, but really just want to help and learn, then I think there comes an opportunity where that executive or that person can eventually reach back out to you and say, you know what, you're doing such a great job. Is there anything I can do for you? How can I help? And then it becomes a more authentic relationship and it can even perhaps turn into a long-term mentoring relationship. And I think that's the best way to navigate a career because it's a little bit more personal. It's not about just taking from someone but learning how to be of service to others." I'm personally aware that networking is challenging for people who don't have ‘connections or ‘experience' in their fields yet, but I always champion the idea of finding ways to meet the people you want to meet, especially in your desired industry, ‘in person'. I think ‘in person' matters for connecting genuinely with people. For getting them to ‘see' who you really are.  How do you think I got Michael Swanson on my show today right after Forbes got him? I had the good fortune to meet Michael ‘in person' when he was in NY from LA when The Temptations and The Four Tops performed at the Westbury Music Fair in Long Island NY. Michael, is involved with the Tony Award Winning Broadway smash hit musical ‘Ain't Too Proud: The Life and Times of The Temptations' and is also co-producing the upcoming Four Tops Musical, ‘I'll Be There' with my buddy Paul Lambert and Duke Fakir. Duke is the only surviving member of the group.   Michael is a beautiful human with a beautiful family. He serves on the board of directors for Wedgwood Circle, Notre Dame's Performing Arts Advisory Council, Success Through Education Program, FEAST and is a member of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. A South Side of Chicago native, Michael resides in Los Angeles with his wife of 29 years, filmmaker and screenwriter Christine Swanson, and their four children. Michael Swanson joined me live from LA on The Debbie Nigro Show to share much more of his warm advice about how to build your professional ‘relationships'.  Enjoy the podcast of our conversation.  If you prefer to read, the Audio Transcript is below. ************************************************************************  AUDIO TRANSCRIPT  0:00:00 And now, back to the Debbie Nigro Show! 2 0:00:24 Okay, life is all about relationships. Let me explain, okay? Actually, I'll let somebody else explain. Hi everybody, I'm Debbie Nigro. I am so excited to introduce you to my next guest. You know, I always say meeting people in person matters, right? I really do think it totally matters, especially in this virtual world we live in. I met Michael the night I went to see The Four Tops and also the Temptations at Westbury Music Fair in Long Island back when. It was a wildly fabulous night.  I met Michael and met his lovely son. What a gentleman. There was something very special about him and there's something very special about him that you guys are going to sense and find out about right now. Michael is a giver by nature. He's not only some big wig Hollywood TV studio executive and film producer and theater producer, which he is all those things, but he is a guy who's created relationships over time that have been really heartfelt and he's spending some time right now educating others on how to do it. Forbes just did a story on how to build a network of professional relationships. He was their first person. They went to interview him as an expert. What Michael said that really just needs to be shared because he's a giver by nature, I mentioned that, is that helping other people is a great way to form long-term relationships. So more about that, but first, welcome Michael and thanks for helping me out by coming on my show today. 1 0:02:10 Good morning, Debbie. It's so wonderful to be with you. Thanks for having me. 2 0:02:13 You're welcome. So you, being the first guy that Forbes called about relationships, probably took a moment, sat back and thought, wow, all my life's work has mattered because I know this matters to you. You have incredibly important advice to people about giving before taking. 1 0:02:31 Yes, yes. I think we are all called to be of service. One thing about networking and mentoring which Forbes wanted to focus on is how do you do it? What's the best way for someone who has had a long career and they wanted me to give advice and some tips. My whole thing is not about going to networking events and some of the less savvy networkers may their first question may become, �Do you have a card? 2 0:03:01 Does anybody have a card anymore? 1 0:03:04 Yeah, I know, right? QR codes. Can I scan your QR codes? I found that a little off-putting. I think it's more important to really engage a person and get to know him or her, ask questions, but in a very genuine and authentic way as opposed to kind of bouncing around collecting information and calculating in your head what's the best way he or she can help boost my career or advance my career so I can climb the ladder. Frankly in my opinion it's just the opposite. How can we be of service to others? I find that when you are in service to others in a genuine way, with an authentic heart and no ulterior motives, but really just want to help and learn, then I think there comes an opportunity where that executive or that person can eventually reach back out to you and say, you know what, you're doing such a great job. Is there anything I can do for you? How can I help? And then it becomes a more authentic relationship and it can even perhaps turn into a long-term mentoring relationship. And I think that's the best way to navigate a career because it's a little bit more personal. It's not about just taking from someone but learning how to be of service to others. 2 0:04:23 If somebody didn't know you and know that you are this heartfelt guy that you are and just saw your title, Hollywood TV studio executive, film producer, theater producer, and they were a young person trying to get into the business. They might be very intimidated by approaching a gentleman like yourself. You're giving some good advice, but how would you like someone to approach you if they were trying to get to know you? 1 0:04:48 My advice would be to simply be yourself. When I meet with a lot of especially recent college graduates or young professionals, that's my advice. There is only one you in this entire world who God has created. So be yourself because no one can be better at you being yourself than you. And then I find that you will relax, you will get centered, you can be yourself and communicate without trying to morph into someone else who you think you're supposed to be to move ahead. 2 0:05:21 Has anybody ever tried to impress you by doing something really out of the box to get your 6 0:05:26 attention? 4 0:05:29 Probably Debbie. But I don't know. 1 0:05:33 I can't think of anything right now. 2 0:05:36 I guess I'm thinking of something funny and I'll share it with you because you did you know one of the key points that was Made in the article and that you know I made Promoting your being on the show today It says that 85% of jobs are filled through networking rather than traditional hiring which is very loud It's a big number and what came to mind is you know a father Always tries to help a daughter or a son and my father God rest his soul He's dead 40 years now once went and repaved some guy's driveway and put in all new shrubs for a guy who wasn't in the TV business because he wanted to make sure he knew who I was by the time I called him. The guy woke up like, what? He didn't even know who I was. So I'm just saying that's funny but people do crazy things to try and get attention to create a relationship and that's the only reason I brought it up. But if in fact 85% right of all the jobs are filled through networking rather than traditional hiring. Like why do people even bother with these, you know, sending resumes into a virtual, you know, hole, a black hole? 1 0:06:36 Yeah, it can become very, rejection is hard for any of us, right? And so when you apply for a job, and even repeatedly sometimes, and you get that rejection or that disappointment, it can be deflating, it can be discouraging, it can even sometimes become depressing because it's like, I've done everything, what can I do? But I have hope in that 15%. You didn't say 100%, you said 85%. So stay positive, is my advice. Stay encouraged and keep submitting. Also, this is one thing that I like to say, which has been true in my life, God will take you to where He needs you to be when He needs you to be there. Sometimes we get rejections or we don't get that job or we don't get that meeting or we don't get that promotion. Sometimes perhaps it's for our own protection. We just may not know that. I'm a big believer, believe it or not, in failure. I think failure is your friend. The key is to learn from your failures, learn from your mistakes, learn from the setbacks, because all of those things are equipping you and preparing you for where you ultimately will end up. So it's not always a bad thing. You know, it's like adding tools to your toolbox that informs how you proceed. So life is hard, right? There are challenges, there are ups and downs, but stay encouraged is the advice that I always get. And importantly, you have to know that things take time. Things take time. Hang in there. Don't get discouraged. Most overnight successes are about ten years. It takes about ten years. 2 0:08:25 At least. Right? 9 0:08:27 I think I'm just peaking, Michael. 4 0:08:28 I love that. 8 0:08:29 That's okay because you know what, Debbie? 2 0:08:30 All of the experience and all of the knowledge and all of the things that you've learned 4 0:08:31 and now you've continued to hone your craft all of these years, it just makes you even 5 0:08:32 more prepared for where you are now. 7 0:08:33 Yes. 1 0:08:34 And have an even bigger platform. So I'm okay with that. I think we live in a microwave society now. Yep. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. 5 0:08:46 And I think we live in a microwave society now. 1 0:08:47 And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. And I think we live in a microwave society now. It's okay to put things in the crockpot. Let things simmer. I like that. Let things simmer. 6 0:08:59 Let things simmer. 2 0:09:00 I like that. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. Let things simmer. works, your celebrated entertainment production company. But you're also the production executive on so many shows that we all love and know, Parks and Recreation, The Good Plays, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Master of None, Good Girls, Never Have I Ever, you've been out there in the movie world, Oh My Gosh, All About You, All About Us, For the Love of Ruth, it goes on, Broadway, Ain't Too Proud, The Life and Times of the Temptations, and then of course the upcoming Four Tops musical with Duke Fakir, the only living member producer and your co-producer. I'm excited to know you. I have to think that as you look back at your life and you are having this conversation with me about how important relationships are to going forward in a career, who is loud in your head right now that helped you along the way? Somebody that did something nice for you in your business? 1 0:10:02 Oh yeah, well you know so many people, Jerry D'Acanio, Clay Mattel, Adrian Backus, there are so many people who have impacted my life, my career. Mentors who I've had, Erwin McManus, pastors along the way like Charles Stanley. You don't always have to know. I know all those folks or know of them, but most of them I've had personal relationships with. But I also want to share, you don't have to know them personally. You can have a mentor or someone who can be very influential in your life or your career by reading his or her book, by listening to their podcast, their interviews, by kind of studying their business decisions, if they are entrepreneurs, kind of seeing what pivots they made when the landscape was changing. So you can learn from everyone, even if you've never met him or her along the way. Excellent. That has really impacted my career and my life as a husband, father, friend, executive and entrepreneur. 2 0:11:12 Excellent advice. And we do live in a world where there is an exorbitant amount of information for everybody to tap into free of charge if they have the energy and the desire, right? Absolutely. Let's talk about your family real quick. I know you have a beautiful wife you married to a long time who's also a great talent, Christine Swanson, and then you have four kids. This is a beautiful life you're living. And I've met one of your sons who was adorable. Which one was that? 1 0:11:35 That was Cole. That was our oldest son, Cole Swanson, who recently graduated from college and now he is doing his thing. He is also in the entertainment industry. He graduated from NYU Tisch School of the Art and focused on directing. So we have another filmmaker in the family. 2 0:11:50 Awesome. And the other kids, are they in the business? Are they coming up behind you? 1 0:11:55 I think they are, Debbie. You know, I have a rising sophomore at Stanford University who will probably major in filmmaking and business. I think he has a great producer's mind. My third son, Luke, that was Kenji who is at Stanford, my third son Luke recently completed the acting and theater workshop this summer at USC. Although he is a rising senior in high school, he wants to study acting and he would say be an on-screen actor to make it clear. I said, well you have to start in theater, that's where you really get your training. And then my daughter Julia is entering high school and she is just as smart as anyone. I think it would be great to have an entertainment attorney in the family, so who knows what her career path would be. But Christine, my wife, and I are blessed to have wonderful children. We've been married 29 years, about a week ago. I'm really grateful and just trying to raise some grounded children in Hollywood. 2 0:12:52 Wow, that is a huge accomplishment. So Michael Swanson, you're doing great. Thank you so much for being my guest today. I remembered your good energy when I met you in person. I knew that you would be accommodating and love to share your information about what you said in Forbes, which is how to build a network of professional relationships. Remember, helping other people is a great way to form long-term relationships. Go out of your way to be of service with a genuine motive and an earnest heart. Michael Swanson, NBCUniversal Senior VP of Production, you have a terrific day. Thank you, Debbie. 1 0:13:24 You too. Thanks for having me. 6 0:13:26 See you again soon, I hope. 2 0:13:27 Okay, real soon. 1 0:13:28 Bye-bye. 5 0:13:29 Bye-bye. Bye-bye.  

The Debbie Nigro Show
Donna my book coach is an open book about her experience with Mounjaro.

The Debbie Nigro Show

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 9, 2023 14:58


Donna Kozik my book coach takes Mounjaro the diabetes drug that the U.S. FDA will likely approve for weight loss later this year.  Mounjaro is supposedly the most powerful of all the buzzy weight loss drugs you've been hearing about like Ozempic, Wegovy, and Rybelsus that have the ability to both control blood sugar and cause weight loss.  Made by Eli Lilly, studies have shown this diabetes drug can lower body mass at its highest dose by up to 15%. According to the American Diabetes Association, sometimes losing just 5% -7% of your body weight is enough to imporove diabetes control. For someone who weighs 200 poinds this is a weight loss of just 10-15 pounds.   Donna is an open book about taking Mounjaro and is excited to share her A1C dropped nearly 5 points to put her in the diabetes under control range.  Part of her story is also that she hasn't lost any weight yet.  Enjoy the podcast of our live conversation on The Debbie Nigro Show about Donna's experience with Mounjaro. For those of you who would rather read about it the audio transcript is below  BTW: Donna's been helping me get my new book done and out there ‘any minute' lol. She's had extreme patience with me. She's the best! Four out of five people want to write a book . The ones who decide to get it done, like me, need a ‘Donna'. Tell her I sent you at doneforyoupublishing.com     ******************************************************************************************** AUDIO TRANSCRIPT: 0:00:00 And now, back to the Debbie Nigro Show. 0:00:18 I listen the more I learn, and then I share with you guys, and then I ask you to listen some more, because then we learn together. Hey, everybody, I'm Debbie Nigro. Wellness is my topic of the day today. I do a whole show once a week on wellness stuff. And of course, there's a lot of buzz continuing about all these drugs out there for weight loss. You've heard the buzz, right, about Ozempic, Lugovy, Riebelsis, but it seems the most powerful of all these buzzy weight loss drugs is called Mounjaro. It's made by Eli Lilly and it's a diabetes drug that can lower your body mass and it's pretty darn effective. So much so that I got a gal pal I want to introduce to you who loves talking about this because it really helped her a lot. This is Donna Kozik you're about to meet. We're going out west to the other part of the United States. She's a very special person in my life who I've never met. Can you imagine? Book coach helping me. We're about to nail that book together finally after five years, but right now she's alive and well and doing so great because she takes Manjaro and she's going to share the excitement about that. Hey Donna, how are you buddy? Hey Debbie. What's going on over there? 2 0:01:35 Oh, it's a sunny day here in San Diego. Can you believe that? 1 0:01:39 No, I can't. We've had a lot of challenges with weather. How's the weather out there? We're struggling over here on the East Coast. Lots of rain and clouds and smoke from wildfires in Canada. What's going on overall in San Diego? Where I supposedly think there's supposed to be sunshine 364 days a year. 2 0:01:56 Yeah, but you know we're coming off of a really cloudy spring. In fact, one of my clients told me that San Diego was the most cloudy city in the United States outside of one in Alaska during April and May. So go figure. 6 0:02:11 Really? 1 0:02:12 Because that's really a bad sign. I always thought San Diego was the place if I was going to move, I would move there because of how much sunshine they had. 2 0:02:20 Yeah, well, it's sunny now, but we had a cloudy spring just to throw everybody off a little bit. 1 0:02:27 Yeah, you want to keep people away just for a little bit. Donna, I loved communicating with you and thanks so much. I told everybody the latest statistics that four and five people want to write a book, only one out of five ever gets it done. I told them that if they're the one who really wants to get it done, they should call you. They need a Donna. And I thank you for standing by me and helping me forward. And we'll talk about that in another show, but part of my excitement of knowing you is seeing you get well. I didn't know you weren't well, but you seem to be getting weller since I've met you and this manjaro is part of the reason? 2 0:03:02 Yeah, you know, like a lot of people, I've struggled with my weight actually my entire life. I was thinking about our conversation this morning. I went on my first diet when I was five years old when some teachers told my parents that I was overweight and also 12 teenage years, it's just my entire life and I've tried all the programs, Weight Watchers and just all kinds of them and just have never been able to find a solution that not only helps me with weight loss but now helps me with controlling my A1C with diabetes. More importantly, Debbie, what I have found in Manjaro has really helped me physically not crave food. And this is something brand new that no other program has ever helped me with. 1 0:03:55 Really? That's kind of what I'm getting at, that people don't desire to eat because eating for many people like you and me, Donna, is emotional. It's like, you know, you're not hungry, but you love the food, so you just, for whatever reason, you're happy, you're sad, you're celebrating, you're miserable. There's always a reason to eat if you're an emotional eater. And I, too, struggled with my weight since I was a little girl. You know, my mother used to try and make melba toast and, you know, try and get me to lose weight at like eight years old. It's just a psycho existence. It's frustrating, right? So this is exciting. You did say to me that yes, your A1C went down and for people who don't know, that's a way of measuring blood sugar, right? And that's most people have type 2 diabetes. The A1C test measures your average blood sugar level over the past couple of months, the higher your level, the higher your risk of developing diabetes-related problems. And people who have been taking Manjaro, correct me if I'm wrong, it's helping their A1C levels go down to where it's not dangerous. Are you out of danger? 2 0:04:59 Yes, I'm out of danger. On three months of Manjaro, my A1C dropped almost five points and went into what's considered 5 0:05:11 controllable levels. 2 0:05:12 Yeah. Yeah, just a huge relief with that. 1 0:05:17 Wow. But you did say, and this is crazy because I assumed you'd be losing weight as well, that you didn't lose any weight, which I found a little surprising since this is supposed to do that too. Talk to that. 2 0:05:29 Yeah, so it is a little surprising, but there's one thing I want to mention first, and I talked about all those different programs and you mentioned about emotional eating which I totally understand and you know kind of growing up with when things are feeling bad or sad or whatever you go make a sandwich like it was just the answer to everything. But for the first time, Manjaro, what it has helped me with is actually feeling normal and this is something that I have talked to coaches and counselors and nutritionist about for years. It's like, why can't I eat, or it seems like I eat like a normal person, but normal people can have cookies in the house and not eat them, or they can leave a plate with food still on it. And there was a part of me that I just could never understand that and I could never do it until I started this drug, where it fills up my stomach and I feel differently about food. I think differently about food and that to me is the real power of these types of weight loss drugs. 1 0:06:37 Amazing. Oh, it's terrible. The FDA, and you're probably aware of this too, is about to approve this particular drug from Eli Lilly, which they're calling the most powerful of them all in the category that is the same as Ozempic and Wachovian rebelsis because they've really seen the ability for it to both control blood sugar and cause weight loss. They said at the highest dose, and I want to ask you about your dose, that people who have taken this have shown to lower their body mass by up to 15 percent. What dose 2 0:07:15 are you taking? Yes, so you start off at 2.5 and it goes up to 15 and I'm currently on 10. Some doctors, frankly I've been educating my doctor a little bit about it because she can't know everything about everything in some regards and also we're so well educated because of commercials and articles that we can read ourselves that the weight loss generally comes later as you increase your dose. So that's one thing that's giving me a little bit of hope. Also that but some doctors will say, well your A1C is down so let's not increase the dose. But from what I understand the power of the drug is that when it comes to that weight loss is as you grow the dosage because what it does is it works with the hormones in your stomach to make you feel full and it kind of mimics sleep 1 0:08:32 surgery with the idea that the food leaves your stomach at a slower rate and so then 2 0:08:39 that's part of what helps you eat less. that effect can lessen unless you increase the drug to the 15, the dose of 15. 4 0:08:52 Yeah, wow. 2 0:08:53 Have you been on other diabetes medications before Mount Jaro? I'm just curious. 1 0:08:58 Yes, I actually tried Ozempic. I was on Ozempic and it was effective for a little bit of time, but then that effectiveness 2 0:08:54 wonders for her so she encouraged me to ask my doctor about it. Okay, very cool 1 0:09:00 and then you know you're watching, you've heard that if people go off this then they seem to gain weight back or I don't think that once you're on a diabetes drug you can just go off it you have to have a replacement for the drug so you feel like this is your answer and you're going to continue on. There are other drugs obviously. 2 0:09:18 Right. Everybody's like, you know, concerned. Like, well, do you have to be on this drug forever? I'm like, I don't care if I do, if it works. Now, I do take other medications for my diabetes and when my A1C dropped, I was able to eliminate one of them and I believe when I lose weight I'll be able to eliminate others and then we'll see about this one but you know I'm going to worry about today today and think about tomorrow tomorrow. 1 0:09:48 Very interesting because people who do lower their A1C and bring it down like you're doing and you know start losing the weight then their diabetes sometimes just goes away. I mean it's just incredible. So this is a very interesting time in the world. We have a major problem in this country and my own dad, and I've mentioned it on the show before, Don, passed away at the age of 55 from complications of diabetes. So I watched a man suffer that nobody wants to see suffer when it doesn't go right. You know, it was just terrible. And it's just, you know, staying in the lane for the new science, right? And then being able to get the drug. Had you had any problems getting Mount Jara because there was as I understand it a supply chain backlog that was keeping people who needed it for diabetes from getting it because everybody was racing to get it for weight loss. What was your experience with that? 2 0:10:39 Yes, that is true and that there was a or there is a run on these drugs and I'll kind of leave that kind of talk, it's just like well you want to get it to the people who need it primarily and focus on that. I wasn't able to fulfill my prescription from through one store so 1 0:11:26 myself and a couple of friends, we called all the pharmacies in the San Diego 2 0:11:17 This is when I needed the 7.5 and I was able to find a pharmacy that has it and they seem to continue to have it. 1 0:11:25 Oh, that's incredible and yes, I appreciate your story. I was actually reading today how to get Monjaro in 2023, which, you know, it's a brand name for what a drug called, am I saying this right, terzepatide? I don't know if I'm saying it right. Anyway, they said a lot of it you can get online. I was like, what? And yeah, telehealth can prescribe this. I didn't know. I didn't know this at all. Did you? 2 0:11:53 No. You know, people are kind of trying different things. And you know, actually, Debbie, I think it's good that patients and people in general can be more educated now and Actually ask doctors about it and things like that. This is the Wild West When it comes to weight loss drugs and I'm certain we'll find our way eventually But I think it's a good thing that we are we can we can ask about these things. I Do too. I really do I think 1 0:12:19 Diabetes and obesity and just people who struggle with their weight their entire lives is like it just keeps them from living the life they really should be living on this planet. If we were able to help crack this incredible challenging code here, boy, a lot of people would have better lives and better times and experiences and less illness and less mental illness because it's a lot combined in there. It really is. It's about self-esteem and confidence and everything, right? Everything. It's just a meaningful time. 2 0:12:53 We could talk for a few hours plus probably about this. Yep. There's just one thing I just want to encourage people who are listening to this and that is if you are feeling frustrated with your way to, of course, diabetic care to seek out answers and solutions and this could be one of them for you. And I think just as a society, we have been just saying for years calories in, calories out but it doesn't work that way and every individual could be different. And so find the solutions that work for you not only with medicine but also emotional emotional help, nutritional help, physical kind of things, it's all combined. And keep seeking those answers because I believe they're out there for you. 1 0:13:48 Yeah, great point Donna. Last question for you dear. Nobody likes to talk about the downside of things they are hopeful about, but did you have any side effects from Mount Jaro that you didn't see coming or you knew were possible? 2 0:14:01 Yeah, a little bit of digestive issues, but those went away after I was on it for about 1 0:14:08 60 days. All right, awesome. Donna Kozik, tell everybody what the name of your company is in case they need your help because I'm so glad I have you in my life. Anybody who wants to write a book and wants to actually get it done, she's an amazing buddy to have, book writing and publishing coach for her company. It's doneforyoupublishing.com, am I right? 2 0:14:28 we're calling it now? Yes, done for you publishing.com you can pick up your own publishing checklist there. Debbie I'm so excited about publishing your book I can't wait to talk to you about that next time. I can't believe we're not 1 0:14:41 getting it done it's called how to talk to strangers advice from a professional stranger talker and we had a lot of laughs about it hopefully we'll have more Don I love you wish you continued great health and thanks for taking the time on the show today. 2 0:14:52 Love you too, Debbie, anytime. Love you too, Debbie, anytime.

The Debbie Nigro Show
A.I. In AMERICA: “The Roaring New Twenties' What the Public Should Know!

The Debbie Nigro Show

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 9, 2023 14:00


A.I. In America, Everything from Celebrity Likenesses to Officiating Over Weddings & More is happening very quickly. You have seen references to A.I Technology in the media almost every day. Most recently with regard to the announcement of actor, Bruce Willis, allowing his A.I. likeness to be used by Deepfake in a commercial venture and potential films. And, also recently the ruling in Denver, Colorado that couples can use an artificial intelligence bot as their officiant, while other countries have banned the idea.   “The Roaring New Twenties” - ‘Prosper in Volatile Times', is an insightful guide to surviving and prospering in The New Roaring Twenties. Written by Paul Zane Pilzer, author of 13 New York Times best-selling book in 25 languages, and Stephen P. Jarchow, who has been involved in the production and distribution of over 250 films and TV series, resulting in two Academy Awards and five Emmy nominations, they have come together to shine a light on one of the hottest topics today in the news and affecting the world today – A.I. Technology. As exciting and futuristic as this all sounds, authors Pilzer and Jarchow contend that our civilization faces a very real danger from “zero-day” cyber-attacks and manipulative algorithms. What should the public know? Stephen P. Jarchow dropped by The Debbie Nigro Show to tell you what he knows about that you should know about in this podcast of our live radio conversation. If you'd rather read about what Stephen had to say the audio transcript of our conversation is below. ABOUT THE AUTHORS Paul Zane Pilzer is an economist, social entrepreneur, and the New York Times best-selling author of 13 books published in 25 languages. He graduated from Lehigh University in three years and received his MBA from the Wharton School in 15 months. He became Citibank's youngest office at age 22 and its youngest vice president at 25 and became an adjunct professor at New York University at age 24 where he was voted “best teacher” five times. Pilzer served as an appointed economic advisor in two White House administrations and has started and/or taken public six companies. His career has been featured in more than 100 publications, including on the front page of the Wall Street Journal. Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart, once said that he was “amazed at Pilzer's business capacity and his ability to put it into laymen's terms.” Stephen P. Jarchow received his BBA, MS and JD from the University of Wisconsin. He has been involved in the production and/or distribution of over 250 motion pictures and television series. Jarchow's films have won two Academy Awards. He has been nominated for five Emmy Awards, winning in 2021 for “Girls Voices Now.” Jarchow has been a principal in more than 100 real estate ventures and is the author of five books on real estate finance.  ***************************************************************************  AUDIO TRANSCRIPT  0:00:00 And now, back to the Debbie Nigro Show! 3 0:00:03 Hi guys, welcome back to the Debbie Nigro Show Really a pleasure always to be with you guys As all you're over there and I'm over here all the time, you know Pretty soon we're gonna, I don't know, artificial intelligence Will somehow get you involved with things you never got involved with… 1 0:00:30 Or get other people involved. And I I don't like the idea of cloning myself into an artificial intelligence version or making a version of me They're doing that you know. Taking people's voices like my own and saying okay. We'll make you do commercials We'll just give us your voice, and we'll do what we want with it. I don't like it But lots of likenesses are being used in commercial ventures one of which I put brought up earlier in the show, Bruce Willis, allowing his artificial intelligence likeness to be used in a commercial venture and potential films. My gosh, right? There are a lot of celebrity likeness stories. I even put up an artificial intelligence wedding ceremony. I was like, what? Yeah, there's a bot, you know, B-O-T, officiating a wedding, and it's in a little video, I think the first one I've ever seen, that I put up on my Debbie Nigro Show Facebook page. Anyway, you're hearing a lot about artificial intelligence technology in the media, you're hearing every day. So yeah, there's a book out, it's called The Roaring New 20s, okay, The New Roaring 20s, The New Roaring 20s. It's a guide that we might all benefit from reading. It's all about surviving and prospering during these crazy times. And it was written by Paul Zane Pilsner, author of 13 New York Times bestselling books in 29 languages. I don't know how people do this. And Stephen Jarchow, who's been involved in the production and distribution of over 250 films and television shows and series. He's had a couple of Academy Awards, five Emmy nominations. So together they sat and they said, okay, we have to talk about this. It's one of the hottest topics today in the news. It's affecting the world. And yes, it sounds exciting. Yes, it sounds futuristic. But they are a little worried that we face as a civilization a pretty big danger from some things we haven't even thought about yet. Cyberattacks, manipulative algorithms. I mean, you know, it's crazy, right? So what should we as the public know? And I've invited Stephen to join me on the show today. We have Stephen Bobby on the line. 5 0:02:57 Yes, we do. 1 0:02:58 Hello, Stephen. 4 0:02:59 Hello. 2 0:03:00 How are you doing? 1 0:03:02 Very nice to meet you. How are you? 2 0:03:04 I'm fine. Just so you know, the title is The New Roaring Twenties. You had it right the first time. 1 0:03:11 Yes, I'm The New Roaring Twenties. Prosper in volatile times, technology driven wealth. It's fantastic and I'm very happy to have you. You spent a lot of time talking about this and writing this together, which must have been an intense time for you. You maybe want to talk about actually writing something like this. 2 0:03:32 Well, Paul and I have known each other for 40 years, since 1982, and we've been good friends and we've participated together in investments in this country and overseas, particularly in Russia in the 1990s, and really know each other pretty well and exchange ideas and enjoy each other's company. Paul had decided to write this book when his children, he has four, decided to ask questions about what the future, the next ten years will hold, particularly with respect to technology and artificial intelligence. Paul was ill last year and he and his wife called me and asked me if I would finish the book for him, which I worked on for about three or four months pretty intensively. The work you have in front of you is the result. It was a labor of love because Paul has been my great friend and also it was an opportunity to communicate some thoughts on subjects that are going to impact all of us over the next decade. 1 0:04:58 First of all, I'm very sorry that he was not well and my thoughts and prayers to him. You as a good friend and obviously a confidant of his, amazing that you jumped in on this, but it's always really fabulous when you have somebody you can talk to about big ideas and not everybody has that. So you are bringing a perspective to people who don't have somebody like you or Paul to talk to about this. If you had to throw out one key thought that comes to mind in the beginning of questions that have been posed or the public might want to know, what do you want the public to know? What's the first thing you want the public to know about what is going on that you guys know? 2 0:05:41 Well, if I may, let me suggest two things that seem to be top line stories. The first is that technology, particularly technology with artificial intelligence, is going to change pretty much everything we do and the way we live our lives. It's going to create great wealth. It's also going to create a stratification where people who have trained themselves and have experience with technology and artificial intelligence will benefit more than those who do not. The related point is that artificial intelligence is something that has been around since the 1950s, and it's a part of our everyday life already in that we use every day a number of AI applications, web search engines like Google search, recommendation systems for YouTube, Amazon, Netflix. We use AI to understand human speech with Siri and Alexa. We have self-driving cars to a certain extent. And then, most recently, chat to GPT and its ability to begin to create content. And this is what is called generative AI, which uses large language models, that is access to hundreds of millions or even more data points in order to actually create content and relay that content in text, code, and images. So this is a dramatic step forward and it's going to accelerate the rate of change significantly so that things that typically took five to ten years will now probably take less than a year. 1 0:07:50 Wow. I would like to ask you a question. I want to jump in on this because of your background. 2 0:07:55 Please jump in. 1 0:07:56 Yes, because of your background, I don't know many people who have made as many films as you have made, or TV series, 250. When I brought up Bruce Willis, allowing his artificial intelligence likeness to be used in a commercial venture, maybe some films, he's probably not the only person who has been approached for this. What is your feeling about this concept? 2 0:08:23 It's going to be a fascinating area. The law at this point is somewhat ambiguous. There is a right of publicity to your image, which has value and so can be licensed, much as Bruce's family has done. That's going to be of value where it becomes a little more ambiguous is what about lesser-known actors or extras, you know, can their images be used using AI to, you know, create a crowd scene, create a situation, and what about an actor who performs in and AI is used to manipulate what they say or what they do. How is that dealt with and what are the legal implications? And the honest answer to your question is no one knows really at this point. We do know that there's a right of publicity, there's a right of privacy and there is law related to that, but these are areas that are ambiguous and kind of a gray space. So we're going to see a lot of litigation related to this, a lot of conversations. Screen Actors Guild in particular view this as a priority and they are working to establish their own guidelines for their personnel. And this is one of the areas that's being discussed and negotiated in the current labor strife that exists where the radio guild and the screen actors guilds are both on strike. 1 0:10:24 go up in strike. Yeah, they have to get ahead of this. It's absolutely necessary based on how fast things are moving that there have to be some rules put in place in advance or this whole thing is just going to go haywire and you know as it is it's a tough industry for people to break into and get a chance in films and television series and if there's artificial intelligence replacing the few jobs that get you know at any given time that is very uncool so I think I think that's great news. Talk about the yeah there's an upside there's a downside hopefully technology with artificial intelligence is changing our time on this planet as humans for the better but there are some dark possibilities okay that pose extreme risks and you even point out that artificial intelligence has the potential to be deadly. I really don't want to hear that, but go ahead. 2 0:11:16 It is depressing to hear. You know, we live in a world where there's all sorts of things going on that are a little anxiety provoking and this just adds to it and perhaps is the seminal worry of the next decade. On the positive side, briefly, artificial intelligence is going to speed up and replace a lot of repetitive work. There's going to be tremendous applications from a medical standpoint. It's going to assist us in protecting our infrastructure, the power grid, and air traffic controllers. It will help with simulations, models, drugs, molecular combinations, forecasting, all sorts of things that are going to be positive. But on the other hand, it's a dual-purpose technology, which is true of a lot of things. We humans are sort of dual-purpose. We can do good or bad. fire, atomic energy, all of these things are dual purpose. Algorithms make mistakes, and we've already seen the issues related to social media and the corrosive effect that that has had on our democracy and our ability to understand understand what is really going on in the world and social media is sort of an early and kind of unsophisticated form of artificial intelligence. Right now, our military and the military of most other countries is weaponizing artificial working around the clock, very aggressively, to create autonomous weapons systems, whereby the decision to fire, kill someone, is going to be, or to drop a bomb, is going to be determined by an algorithm. 1 0:13:31 Unfortunately, boy, Stephen, I want to read your book and I will read it all the way through. I hope everybody listening will read it as well. It's really kind of fascinating. The New Roaring Twenties, well thought out. Prosper and Volatile Times, it sounds like the upside is to read the book. Technology Driven Wealth, Paul Zane Pilsner and Stephen P. Jartow. Thank you so much, Stephen. I really wish we had more time together, but you can come back any time. I really wish we had more time together, but you can come back any time. My pleasure.      #newroaring20s #ai #artificialintelligence #stephenpjarchow #technology #prosper #volatiletimes #2023  

Mosaic Boston
The Greatest Act of Faith

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 6, 2023 47:47


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit MosaicBoston.com. Heavenly Father, you are blazing in your holiness, and we thank you that you are tender in your love, and we thank you for the holy scriptures in which you reveal your will to us, and we thank you that you reveal yourself to us. Lord, as we meditate on a text of one of your saints approaching death, I pray, Lord, minister to us, remind us that we are mortal, that we will die, but it's not our souls that die, it's just our bodies. Lord, I pray that as we meditate on death, that you give us an extra portion of the Holy Spirit to think about these things seriously and sober-mindedly, so that each one of us is prepared today to meet you. For those who do not yet know you, Lord, I pray give them a desire to know you, give them a desire to know if these things in the holy scriptures are true, give them a desire to know is Jesus God, and give them the desire to wrestle with you, Jesus, to wrestle with your claims and to wrestle with your person. I pray that as they do, that you meet them, and that you bless them, and that you walk with them. For those who are not yet Christians, Lord, save them today and usher them into your kingdom by giving them the gift of the new birth. We pray all this in Christ's name. Amen. We are continuing our sermon series called Graduate Level Grace, A Study in the Life of Joseph. We are nearing the end of it., As we near the end of it, the story goes from Joseph primarily to now Jacob. The title of the sermon today is The Greatest Act of Faith. The narrative here shifts from Joseph to his father, Jacob. The text slows down, and it does so deliberately to focus our attention on a man's last days. We've seen the life of Jacob, and we've learned many truths, and now we get a glimpse into how he prepares to die. The lesson here is that we ought to think about death. Do you think about death? You should. Few things in life teach us how to live in a more profound way than meditating upon death. Once in a while, the Lord reminds you that you're going to die. Sometimes it's through a near death experience. This week, or it was last week, I was on Bible Gateway. On Bible Gateway there's the Google Ads, and they target you. They're always kind of funny for they think they got me with this ad. They didn't get me. But then I'm preparing this sermon on death and the ad that comes up, I see this gentleman in the ad, I'm like, "What are they trying to sell me?" Then at the bottom I see it's an ad for Depends. It's a product called Depends. If you don't know what Depends are, you're lucky and probably young. Now I'm getting targeted with these ads. Unfortunately, with every day we are getting closer to death and we are to prepare. Ecclesiastes 7:1-4 says, "A good name is better than precious ointment and the day of death than the day of birth. It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting. For this is the end of all mankind and the living will lay to heart. Sorrow is better than laughter. For by sadness of face, the heart is made glad. And the heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth." And as Jacob approaches his death, we see that his faith is never stronger. It actually grows. How he behaves himself in this chapter, what he says, what he does, the posture of heart, this text is marked as his greatest act of faith in all of scripture. Why do I say that? Because of what Hebrews 11 says. If I was writing Hebrews 11, the Hall of Faith, this is the greatest saints and the greatest act of faith. If I was writing that chapter about Jacob, a little paragraph about his greatest act of faith, what would I choose? What act would I choose? Most likely it's that one occasion where he wrestles with God and it says that he wrestled with a man who then it turns out to be God. Theologians call this a Christophany, an appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ. He wrestled with Jesus Christ and he wouldn't let go and they wrestled all night. If you know anything about wrestling, it's exhausting. That's why most matches are six minutes. He's wrestling all night. He's saying, "Lord, I'm not going to let you go until you bless me." I think the Lord was letting him win. I think that's what was happening. Then the Lord Jesus just touches his hip, bop, something happened and then the rest of his life he walked with a limp. He had the blessing of wrestling with God himself. Or was it the occasion where he has another vision in Bethel where he sees a staircase between heaven and earth and he sees angels ascending and descending on the staircase of God? The Lord had some incredible moments with Jacob to test his faith, to grow his faith. But in Hebrews 11, the act of faith that is pointed out, that is singled out as the greatest act of faith in Jacob's life was this Hebrews 11:21, "By faith Jacob when dying blessed each of the sons of Joseph bowing in worship over the head of his staff." Perhaps we wouldn't have chosen this incident, but God, the Holy Spirit did. Why is this his greatest act of faith? Well, what is faith? Hebrews 11:1 says, faith. Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen. The conviction that the most important things in life, the most meaningful things in life are not seen. The most important things in life are spiritual, they're invisible, they're immaterial, and in many ways they are future things. Jacob's greatest act of faith comes in his last days. This is a great vision for life, knowing that if the Lord is giving me life, today could be the day of my greatest act of faith. You may have peaked physically, but certainly while you're still alive, you have not peaked spiritually. II Corinthians 4:16, "So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day." May this be true for you and for me. The context of our chapter here in Genesis 48 is that prior to coming to Egypt, Jacob stopped in Bathsheba and he worshiped and he made sacrifices to the Lord. He was wondering, "Lord, are you with me? Are you going to Egypt with me?" The Lord appeared to him and said, "Do not fear. I will go with you and Joseph will close your eyes with his hand as you die," a tender promise there. And three times in these last chapters, Joseph comes to the bedside of Jacob. Today. We're looking at the second such occurrence. Jacob is facing death, but he's not doing it with fear. He's doing it with faith. Three points as we walk our way through the text. First, the greatest act of faith is sharing the faith. Second, share the faith by sharing your faith. And third, salvation is by grace through faith. First, the greatest act of faith is sharing the faith. By sharing, I mean doing everything you possibly can to transmit the faith, to compel, to persuade, to teach, but then also to live it out. Because faith in many ways is taught, but also in many ways it's caught, like in the parable of the great banquet, the Lord says, "Go out to the highways and the hedges and compel people to come in that my house may be filled." This is what the Lord Jesus Christ told us in the great commission, "Go out and make disciples of all people." I had a conversation after one of my sermons recently and I was asked, "Are you trying to make America a Christian nation?" It was a very loaded question. I said, "Look, I'm trying to make people Christians and people from all nations. That's my job. We are called to convert." She said, "Are you trying to change people's minds about..." "Yes, oh yes. Yes we are. Yes, that's our mission, that's our job." She's like, "But don't they get offended when you're telling them they're wrong?" I'm like, "At least they're paying attention. Now we can start a relationship and actually deal with the things that cause offense, but this is our job." Why do we do this? Because we care for people's eternal destinies. We care for people's eternal souls. We want people to live an eternal bliss and glory with the Lord Jesus Christ forever. This is what the text shows us that Jacob does with his sons and what they do in Egypt. Genesis 48:1-4, after this, Joseph was told, "Behold your father is ill." So he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, and it was told to Jacob, "Your son Joseph has come to you." Then Israel summoned his strength and sat up in bed and Jacob said to Joseph, "God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me and said to me, Behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply, and I will make of you accompany of peoples and will give this land to your offspring after you for an everlasting possession." It says He summoned his strength and he sat up in bed. He rallies his strength. It's a dose of fresh strength that comes with purpose. He knows he's got to get up. He knows he's got to do this thing that the Lord is calling him to do, to bless Joseph's sons. The first thing he remembers is that God appeared to him. "God almighty appeared to me," he says. Loses the old name for Bethel. And God appeared to Jacob twice in Bethel, 20 years apart. The first time when he was leaving the Promised Land, and then when he was coming back to meet with Esau. God appears to him twice. And then he says, "God Almighty appeared to me and he blessed me." In his last moments, in his last days, he wants to be remembered for what? For this. For God. For his relationship with God. He's saying, "Son, whatever you remember of your father, remember God Almighty. May God Almighty appear to you. May God reveal himself to you. May God bless you." And you can feel the authenticity of Jacob's faith in his voice. It's almost palpable as he's trembling, the gravitas, the seriousness. How does he want to be remembered by his grandsons? Like this, believing, worshiping, prophesying, praying over them, blessing. He's loving, he's affectionate, he's personal, he's tender. This is the greatest legacy that we can leave to our children and then to the people around us. The greatest legacy that we can leave, the greatest inheritance that we can leave, be a father or a mother to our children, or just as a believer to those who are not yet Christians, it's the knowledge of the Lord. Children, I want you to know God. I had a personal relationship with God. You too can have a personal relationship with God and this is the best thing for you. The greatest thing you can do for your children is to bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. The greatest thing you can give them is teaching them that God is the greatest blessing. A relationship with God is the greatest blessing. So to worship him, to glorify him, to thank him is the greatest blessing for our souls. Scripture teaches us that whoever doesn't provide for his household is worse than an unbeliever. And yes, that has to do with material provision. We are to provide for the bodies that God has entrusted to us, but how much more so is it imperative to provide for their souls? Why was this event considered Jacob's greatest act of faith? Because he believed and he believed so authentically and sincerely that his faith was transmitted to the next generation. It was transmitted to his sons and then it was transmitted to his grandsons. What's fascinating here is that Ephraim and Manasseh, the grandsons of Jacob, they didn't receive a direct revelation from God. God did not speak to them. No. This is how God chose to reveal himself to them through the testimony of their grandfather. What's fascinating is that God does not speak out loud audibly for another 400 years after Genesis ends, until he finally speaks to Moses in the burning bush. So Jacob is transferring the promises of the covenant to his son and to his adopted sons, both with his words and with his life. Psalm 78:1-7 says, "Give ear, oh my people to my teaching. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings from of old, things that we have heard and known that our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord and his might and the wonders that he has done." He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to our children, that the next generation might come to know them and might know them and the children yet unborn and arise and tell them to their children so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments. One of the beauties of sharing your faith is once you start speaking your faith out loud, you begin to realize your gaps in knowledge or your gaps in faith. The more you share your faith, the better you become at it because God gives grace of knowledge to those who share. This is a promise that's given to us in Philemon that we can know God deeper, the things of God in a more profound way and the path to that profound knowledge of the faith, that depth of faith is sharing our faith. Philemon 1:4-6, "I thank my God always when I remember you in my prayers because I hear of your love and of the faith that you have toward the Lord Jesus and for all the saints. And I pray that the sharing of your faith may become effective for the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ." Well, you can't share what you don't have. So if you are to share your faith, you got to say, "Do I really believe this? Am I living as if I believe this? And why does he have to pray for effective sharing of your faith?" Because sharing your faith is more effective when your faith is real. So he's praying for their faith to be ignited in such a way that they can't but share it. And as they share it, the more you share your faith, the deeper and fuller your knowledge of every good thing becomes the more effective you are. We are to share our faith at every opportunity we can and we are to use... In Genesis 48:5-6, the text continues. "And now your two sons who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt are mine. Ephraim and Manasseh shall be mine as Ruben and Simeon are. And the children that you fathered after them shall be yours. They shall be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance." So Joseph comes in with his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. Manasseh is the oldest. He says, "Your sons, Joseph, are mine." In what sense? In the sense that he's just their grandfather? No, because then he wouldn't have to say it. That's just understood. No, he says, "Now they're mine in the same way that Reuben and Simeon are mine." Reuben and Simeon are his real biological children, but in a sense Jacob displaces them with his grandsons. Why did he do that? Because of Reuben and Simeon's sins against their father. I Chronicles 5:1-2 comments on this, "The sons of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, for he was the firstborn, but because he defiled his father's couch, his birthright was given to the sons of Joseph, the son of Israel, so that he could not be enrolled as the oldest son. "Though Judah became strong among his brothers and the chief came from him, yet the birthright belonged to Joseph." So here, Reuben and Simeon through their sin, have squandered the blessing of the birthright and they squandered the blessing of their father. There's many a lesson here. The very moment you come to the Lord Jesus Christ and you repent of sin, he forgives you for the penalty of sin. But often in life there are sins that when you commit you will bear the consequences of that sin for the rest of your life. Through sin, we do squander blessings. That's what happened with these guys. Therefore by adopting them, Jacob is making them leaders in the tribes of Israel. Therefore, there were not just 12 tribal figures in Israel, there were 13 because Joseph is given two places as his great honor with Ephraim and Manasseh. Then Levi was the tribe that belonged to the Lord and they ministered in the tabernacle. So the land was divided amongst the 12 tribes, which included the sons of Joseph. Joseph's two sons here, their dad's still alive, they're introduced into the heirship of their father, Joseph, who's still living. They become joint heirs with Joseph. This is very relevant to us because the moment you trust in Jesus Christ, he becomes your Lord and Savior. We become joint heirs with Christ. His inheritance becomes our inheritance. His righteousness becomes our righteousness. We share as the sons of God and the firstborns right in the privilege of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so what is Jacob doing? He's imputing something to the sons of Joseph, and this is how grace works. We repent and we turn from sin and we trust in Jesus Christ and his blood sacrifice on the cross in our stead, substitutionary atonement the moment you believe you become joint heir and you are adopted into the family of God. This is exactly what happens when sinners through faith are counted reckoned righteous by virtue of the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're adopted into the family of God. God is our father. Jesus is our older brother with his righteousness, inheritance imputed to us. This is important to know, that just by virtue of you being a human being, that's not enough to be a child of God. We do not enter the kingdom of God through natural birth. Therefore, there are human beings who have not yet trusted in Jesus Christ. They're outside of the kingdom of God and they are not children of God. This for many people, this comes as a surprise because we've been taught God loves everybody and you don't have to do anything about it. You're just a child of God. That's not true. If you're living as an enemy of the cross, by not trusting that Jesus Christ had to die for your sins, that this was absolutely necessary for your salvation, you are not born again. And if you're not born as a child of God, a scripture says that you are child of the enemy. Jesus even said to the Pharisees, "Your children of Satan," harsh words to melt hard hearts so people repent and turn to Christ. Jesus is clear about this in John 1:11-13. "He came to his own and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." Imagine that. No matter what your family status, no matter what kind of family, faith background you have, no matter what your pedigree religiously speaking, no matter what you have done, no matter the sins that you have committed, no matter how you much you've transgressed God's law, no matter how much you've spat at the honor of God, the very moment you come to Lord and you receive him, "Yes Lord, I receive your grace. Lord, forgive me. Pardon me, Lord. I repent of my sin." The very second you believe in him, receive him, you will be born again. That's the promise of God and you're born into the family of God. Genesis 48:7 continues, "As for me, when I came from Paddan to my sorrow, Rachel died in the land of Canaan on the way when there was still some distance to go to Ephrath and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath, that is Bethlehem." Joseph, the firstborn of Rachel, is standing before Jacob and reminds him of his mom, Rachel. He includes a comment here. Then verse eight, when Israel saw Joseph's sons, he said, "Who are these?" Joseph said to his father, "They are my sons whom God has given me here." And he said, "Bring them to me please that I may bless them." Now the eyes of Israel were dimmed with age so that he could not see, so Joseph brought him near and he kissed them and embraced them. I love that verse, that very end, just to see this man, this great man of faith, him in his most intimate moments. What does he... He's affectionate. He's affectionate with his children. He's affectionate with his grandchildren. Here just a word of reminder, in particular dads are... And to anyone to whom this perhaps doesn't come naturally, do you hug? Do you embrace? Do you kiss? Do you bless your children? This should be the natural rhythm of your lives. I have four daughters. It's so easy to be tender with them. They're so sweet. My third daughter is eight. Ekaterina is her name. We call her Ekat. She texts me sometimes from her mom's phone and she said, "Dad, this is Ekat." I know it is Ekat because she's got the emojis, what are they called? She got that game going. She's a little kissy and she always includes a dog at the end because she's trying to get a dog from us still. And then I respond with what? I heart it and I send little kissy things. But this should be the natural rhythm of our lives to love and to love tenderly and to love affectionately. This is a reminder that grandchildren are a blessing. Proverbs 17:6 says, "Grandchildren are the crown of the aged and the glory of children is their fathers." This was a blessing upon Israel. Psalm 128:6, "May you see your children's children. Peace be upon Israel." And then verse 11 of Genesis 48, "And Israel said to Joseph, I never expected to see your face and behold God has let me see your offspring also. Then Joseph removed them from his knees and he bowed himself with his face to the earth and Joseph took them both, Ephraim on his right hand toward Israel's left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel's right hand and brought them near to him." What's Joseph doing? Joseph understands how hugely important this moment is. Jacob, as the patriarch of the family, is also the priest of the family. His blessing is important because it's effectual. Ephraim, the younger son, he directs toward Jacob's left hand. Manasseh, the older son, he directs toward Jacob's right hand. Throughout scripture, the right hand is considered the place of honor and the place of greatest blessing. That's why Jesus Christ, the resurrected Christ, right now is sitting at the right hand of God the Father. Verse 14, "And Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on the hand of Ephraim, who was the younger and his left hand on the head of Manasseh crossing his hands for Manasseh was the firstborn." Now this right here throws Joseph for a loop. We'll get to what he does. What's happening is that Jacob is breaking societal norms. The firstborn who's blessed by the right hand gets a double share of the inheritance. For example, Joseph got the double share of the land by virtue of the fact that he got the blessing that should have gone to Reuben or Simeon. And Judah got the double portion of authority while Joseph got the double portion. That's supposed to go to the oldest. The oldest gets a double portion. Everything that the other children get, the oldest is supposed to get double that, double share of the inheritance. But Jacob here crosses his hands, and the Hebrew it's sakal, to lay crosswise. Joseph isn't happy about this, but he waits to interject knowing how solemn the moment is. This brings us to point two, share the faith by sharing your faith. Verse 15, "And he blessed Joseph and said The God before whom my father's Abraham and Isaac walk, the God who has been my shepherd, all my lifelong to this day, the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the boys and in them let my name be carried on in the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth." So he's blessing the sons of Joseph, but the text tells us in verse 15, "He blessed Joseph." He blessed Joseph by praying a prayer of blessing upon the sons of Joseph. What's the text communicating? It's communicating that the greatest blessing he can give Joseph is to bless his grandchildren because the greatest blessing a parent can receive is to see their children being blessed by the Lord. Does this sound like a man who thinks death is the end? No. He knows that God is going to be with them after he passes on to be with his fathers in heaven. This whole prayer is full of hopeful immortality. The prayer is triple pronged. It's a triune blessing. He talks about God and then he talks about God, and then he talks about the angel. He mentions three persons, the God, the God, and then the angel, which is Christ. In verse 16, he uses the singular. He says, "You," singular, "God bless these boys." This isn't a full revelation of the trinity, but it's certainly in accord and consistent with the trinity. First, Jacob calls the Lord his shepherd with emphasis on the Lord's holistic provision. As a shepherd, he knows intimately, in depth he understood what it means that the Lord has been shepherding him. He knows the Lord as a good shepherd has been with him in good times and has led him through the valley of the shadow of death. This is how the psalmist speaks about our relationship with the Lord. The question as we read this text is, is God your Lord? Is God your shepherd? Do you follow Jesus Christ as your shepherd where he tells you what to do, understanding that everything he tells us is for his glory and our good? Psalm 23, "The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in path of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For you are with me and your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." Jacob hasn't been the best sheep. He's been stubborn in many ways in many seasons of his life, but he knows, "The Lord, the good shepherd has been with me." He says the angel, "The angel who redeemed me from all evil." Who's he talking about here? "The angel that redeemed me." Well, how can an angel redeem? The only way redemption was done is through a blood sacrifice. What is he talking about here? Well, this is a prophetic text about Jesus Christ. The word for redeemed is the same word that's used in the context of the kinsman redeemer, Goel, in the story of Ruth and Boaz. He says, "I have lived an evil life in many ways, but Jesus Christ whom I wrestled with, he tamed me." "He broke my hip. The rest of my life, I was walking with a limp as a reminder of the fact that he is God and I am not." In many ways he wrestled with Jesus Christ in the same way that we are called to wrestle with Jesus Christ. If you are not a Christian, if you're not sure what you believe or if you are a believer, I am just telling you most of the people in your life are not believers. We're going to finish this sermon series and then we're going to do a one week of vision, Lord willing, and then we're going to start a sermon series through the Gospel of Mark. We're calling it Kingdom Come, Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom. The intention of that whole series is we want to introduce people to Jesus Christ, to his teaching from the holy scriptures, present it as best as we can that there is reason to believe. And then give people an opportunity to wrestle with Christ yourself. If you want the greatest blessing in life, and that's to know God and be known by God and to have all your sins forgiven, the responsibility is on you. It's not on me. It's not on Christians. We do the best we can and we share our faith just like Jacob is sharing his faith. Remember 17 years before this text, he met with Pharaoh and Pharaoh said, "How many are the days of your years?" And he said, "The days of my years have been evil and few." Even to Pharaoh, he was already sharing his faith. "My life has been evil, Pharaoh, but I have been redeemed by the angel who is Jesus Christ. I have wrestled with him. I have known him, and I have had my evil in my sin redeemed." When you do that and when you trust in the Lord, and when you believe that Jesus took your evil upon himself in order to redeem us, in order to give us grace, well that puts everything into perspective. He does share his faith here. As we share the faith, we are to share our faith and share the moments in life where, you know what, this was evil that I did. I have transgressed God's law, but God saved me. God gave me grace. And because God gave me grace and I'm so sure of it, he's redeemed me. He's taken off the shame. He's taken off the guilt. He's given a new purpose in life. He's done that for me and I am more wicked than you could ever imagine. He can do that for you as well. That's what he's doing. Then point three is salvation is by grace through faith. Verse 17, "When Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him and he took his father's hand to move it from Ephraim's head to Manasseh's head. And Joseph said to his father, Not this way, my father. Since this one is the firstborn, put your right hand on his head." Well, this is the law of primogeniture, it's called. It's the cultural norm that the oldest was supposed to be more blessed, but Jacob himself broke that manmade law by supplanting Esau, Ishmael, and we see the other examples. Ishmael was the firstborn, but it was Isaac through whom the seed would come. Reuben had lost the blessing of the firstborn. Judah is the one through whom the seed will come. And so here, Ephraim is firstborn. His firstborn rights among the tribes Israel are over that of Manasseh. Ephraim was blessed. The successor of Moses, Joshua, came from Ephraim, which is a big deal. But why does he do this? Why does that happen and why does that happen in scripture all the time where it's like this guy is expected to be blessed above and beyond and then God just crosses his hands? Well, the point is that nature does not necessarily inherit the things of God. We don't inherit blessing through our physical body or through the things that are physical. If the oldest always necessarily inherited the blessings, we might get the idea that blessings come from our nature. God reverses things over and over and over again to remind us that if God is going to bless people despite their sin, it has to be by grace and by grace alone. The first Adam was rejected while the last Adam, Christ has the firstborn rights by virtue of a saving work on the cross. We're not blessed because we do good works or hold some high position in society. We're blessed by God's sovereign grace. If we're blessed, we're blessed because God chose to bless us. In I Corinthians 1:26, "For consider your calling brothers, not many of you are wise according to the worldly standards." Not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him, you are in Christ Jesus who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption so that as it is written, let the one who boasts boast in the Lord. Praise be to God that Jacob crossed his hands, and praise be to God that God the Father sent his son Jesus Christ to go to the cross. That's the ultimate cross of blessing. Whereas like Jesus, you did not deserve our curse. You did not deserve to die like that. You did not sin. We sinned. I deserve to be on that cross, not Jesus Christ, the blameless Son of God. But God crosses everything at the cross. He takes our curse so that we could have the blessing of God. It's so good because it's true. All of this is true. God, so to speak, crosses his hands and bestowing his blessings, giving them to those who in our eyes are least worthy of them and least likely to receive them. God is responsible for the blessing of man and he blesses sovereignly. Joseph says, "No, no, no. Father, no. Father, do I have to remind you I am the vice president of Egypt? Father, not like that." That's what he's saying. "It's not fair." That's what Joseph is saying. "This isn't fair, this isn't the way." But the Lord doesn't do what we deem fair. He does what his will determines should be done and whatever his will determines should be done is right. What's right? What's fair? It's what God decides. This is one of the reasons why Jesus gave us this parable in Matthew 20 where he talks about grace and that the owner of grace, that's God, can do whatever he wants with grace. Matthew 20:1-16 says, "For the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. And after agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going about the third hour, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and to them he said, You go into the vineyard too and whatever is right I will give you. So they went going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour he did the same thing. And about the 11th hour, he went out and found others standing and he said to them, Why do you stand here idle all day? They said to him, Because no one has hired us. He said to them, You go into the vineyard too. And when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, Call the laborers and pay them their wages beginning from the last up to the first. When those hired about the 11th hour came, each of them received the denarius. And now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. On receiving it, they grumbled at the master of the house saying, These last worked only one hour and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat. But he replied to one of them, Friend, I'm doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go, I choose to give to this last worker as I gave to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me or do you begrudge my generosity so the last will be first and the first last? Do you begrudge my generosity?" That's exactly what Jacob is saying, "I am giving out the blessings." By the way, he was filled with the Holy Spirit as he was doing it. H chooses to bless the younger over the older. Verse 19 of chapter 48, "But his father refused and said, I know my son. I know. He also shall become a people and he also shall be great. Nevertheless, his younger brother shall be greater than he and his offspring shall become a multitude of nations." Perhaps this is why this moment is considered Jacob's greatest act of faith because he hears the word of God. He hears God speaking in his heart and he acts on the basis of it even in the face of displeasure-filled counsel from his prime minister son. Verse 20, "So he blessed them that day saying, By you Israel will pronounce blessing, saying God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh. Thus, he put Ephraim before Manasseh. Then Israel said to Joseph, Behold I am about to die, but God will be with you and will bring you again to the land of your fathers. Moreover, I have given to you rather than to your brothers one mountain slope that I took from the hand of the Amorites with my sword and with my bow." You in verse 21, "God will bring you out of Egypt." That's plural. Joseph and all of his descendants will come out. This land that he's giving him was the land of the Shechemites. Jacob had purchased a plot of land from Shechem and he now bequeaths this to Joseph and his sons. He promises that "God will be with you. No matter what happens, Joseph, when I pass, in the same way that God has been with me, may he be with you and your children and your children's children. May God be with you." This is what makes heaven heaven. It's the place where God will be our God and we will be as people and in fellowship. It begins here. "I will be your God and I will be with you, my people here on earth." Isaiah 59:21, "As for me, this is my covenant with them says the Lord. My spirit that is upon you and my words that have put in your mouth shall not depart out of your mouth or out of the mouth of your offspring or out of the mouth of your children's offspring, says the Lord, from this time forth and forever more." As we close and as we transition to Holy Communion, a question before us is do you fear death? That's really a good test of how strong your faith is. Do you fear death? I was at my gym last Saturday, it was like 95 at 9:00 AM and it was a hundred percent humidity. I go to this old school boxing gym where air conditioning... I asked the guy one time, "Is there air conditioning?" And he just laughed in my face. It was one of those places on a Saturday workout. It was a 90-minute workout. This guy that shows up regularly and we know each other, he's like, "Dude, after work, I almost died. I think I almost died. That was the closest I've ever been to death." I just looked at him. Any opportunity I have to Jesus juke someone and bring in the gospel, I do it all the time. I said, "Well, good thing I'm ready to die." I said it like that in a way that caused him to pause. He's like, "What do you mean?" I was like, "I am ready to die right now after this workout. That would be easier I think than driving home after this thing." He's like, "What do you mean? Do you go to Valhalla?" Because he thinks I'm a Viking. Long story. I call him the Italian Stallion. He calls me the Vike. That's true Brother Lilo. I was like, "No, because I believe in Jesus Christ." He's like, "Believing in Jesus Christ keeps you from dying?" I was like, "In a sense. Death is just a transition." It's just a corridor for the believer in Christ. You just transition from living here and now to living in the presence of God. And the promise is given to us that when we believe in the gospel that we can have eternal life that begins now. Why can we believe in that promise? Because Jesus Christ on the cross, he didn't just vanquish sin, he also vanquished death. In the death of Christ we see the death of death itself. I'll close with this and then we'll transition to Communion. I Corinthians 15:50-58, "I tell you this, brothers, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable." "Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written. Death is swallowed up in victory. Oh, death, where is your victory? Oh, death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, the movable always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain." Every first Sunday at Mosaic, first Sunday of the month, we celebrate Holy Communion as was commanded to us by the Lord Jesus Christ, for whom is Holy Communion at Mosaic? Holy Communion is for repentant believers in Jesus Christ. If you have not trusted in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, we ask that you refrain from this part of the service. It'll do nothing for you. Instead, meditate on the gospel. If you even today repent of your sins, you are welcome to partake. If you have not received the elements, please raise your hand and one of the ushers will hand them out. In the meantime, would you pray with me over Holy Communion? Heavenly Father, we thank you for your love that you lavished upon us and sending your son Jesus Christ. And Jesus, we thank you that you lived the life of perfect obedience to God, the Father and everything, and you loved God and you loved neighbor as yourself perfectly. And you loved us so much so that you gave yourself as a blood sacrifice for our redemption. We thank you Jesus, that you didn't stay dead, but you conquered death itself as you triumphantly rose from the grave on the third day. We, Lord, repent of our sins corporately, and we repent of our sins individually. Lord, forgive us. Forgive me. Lavish your grace upon us and upon me. Lord, continue to sanctify us by the power of the Holy Spirit and draw many to yourself. We pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. There's a top and a bottom lid. If you take the bottom lid off the bread is there. On the night that Jesus Christ was betrayed, he took the bread and after breaking it, he said, "This is my body broken for you. Take, eat and do this in remembrance of me." He then proceeded to take the cup and he said, "This cup is the new covenant of my blood. Take, drink and do this in remembrance of me." Lord God, we thank you for your promise where you said that to all of those who come to you, with humility and contrition of heart, though our sins are like scarlet, you will make us white and pure as snow. Lord, I pray that you give each one of us that purity of heart. We thank you for the promise that those who are pure in heart shall see God. We pray for the gift of purity of heart and we pray for ever deeper revelations from you and revelations with you. Continue to bless our worship service Lord, and fill our hearts with joy, and help us sing with everything we've got to the God of the universe who's worthy of our worship. We pray all this the beautiful name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Reject Victimhood

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later May 21, 2023 44:39


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry. Please visit mosaicboston.com. Lord God, we thank You for giving us the holy scriptures, and we know that the center of the holy scriptures is Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Jesus, we thank You that You lived the perfect life on our behalf, fulfilled all of the commandments of God, all the will of God perfectly, and then Lord, You went to a cross, so You were crucified on our behalf, burying the wrath of God that we deserve for our law-breaking. Then, Lord, we thank You that You didn't stay dead, but You rose victoriously over Satan's sin and death, and because of Your resurrection, You offer us salvation, You offer us both mercy and grace. Mercy in that, You do not give us the condemnation we deserve. Grace in that, You give us the righteousness of Christ, and we thank You, Lord, for Your grace. We thank You that we are saved by grace through faith. If there's anyone here who's not yet a Christian, has not had their sins forgiven, I pray today, Lord, draw them to Yourself. By the power of the Spirit, convert them, and, Lord, use this sermon series to teach us that we will never graduate from needing grace, and at some seasons in life, we do need a graduate-level grace, and if there's any one season like that now, a season of suffering, trial, tribulation, I pray be especially close to them. Show us that because of what You did with Christ, You took the greatest evil ever in the crucifixion of Christ, and You turned it into the greatest good ever, the resurrection of Christ. You can turn our evil into good as well. Bless our time in the holy scriptures, and we pray all this in the beautiful name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Today, we're excited to start a new sermon series through Genesis 37 through 50. We're entitling it Graduate Level Grace: A Study In the Life of Joseph. The idea behind this text and behind the series is we come to know the Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ when we're saved by grace through faith, but that's just a start of our relationship with the Lord, a walk with the Lord, and then often, the Lord does take us through seasons in life where it seems like we're about to embark on the next level, and with the next level, we need next-level grace. The title of the sermon today is Reject Victimhood. Why this series? It's a story about a young man, who goes from just a shepherd to a Prime Minister in 13 years, but those 13 years include a lot of suffering. We're going to learn many lessons, Lord willing, glean much wisdom about the most important things in life, the most important parts of life, family, relationships, work, prayer, vision, godliness, influence, authority, leadership, integrity, rejection, betrayal, reconciliation, forgiveness, adversity, and prosperity. A quick recap of where we find ourselves, Genesis is the book of beginnings. In the beginning, we see a personal, loving, sovereign God, who creates the universe and rules over it, and God creates humanity in His image and blesses them with the mandate, "Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and govern it, reign over it. Love God," He tells them, "And love one another, have a family, raise your children to do the same." That was God's vision for humanity, but in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve, man, humanity, wickedly rebels against God. They seek to be equal with God, and so sin introduces the reign of death in the world, but God is a good God and He doesn't leave us in our sin. To save humanity, God promises to send a Savior, who will come from the seed of Abraham to save the world. The Lord chooses a family, chooses Abraham and says, "Abraham, I'm going to bless you with a family, and through your family, I'm going to send a Savior that will bless the families of the world." Abraham, Isaac, and then Jacob. We find ourselves here in the story of Jacob. He takes us Genesis 25 through 50, half the book. He is Israel after all, the direct ancestor of the nation of Israel and the father of the 12 sons from whom would come the 12 tribes. The thing that we notice about the life of Joseph is he comes from a big, dysfunctional family, a family that's riven by jealousy and hatred. They're a covenant family with God's blessing upon them, but they're torn apart by conflict, through intermarriage with pagans, et cetera, but we see that the Lord uses Joseph and his suffering to bring this hate-filled family together, and at the end, we see the family reconciled, purified, and preserved in safety in Egypt. Look at the stories of redemption in scripture. One of the greatest is the apostle Paul. He goes from being a terrorist of the Church, a persecutor of Christians to being the apostle, the evangelist to the Gentile's incredible redemption, story of redemptive arc, but ultimately, this story of Joseph is arguably even greater of a redemptive story. The story is about how God intervenes despite the brokenness, despite the sin, despite the folly, we see His grace intervene, and He takes all of the evil, the sin, the brokenness, and He brings it all together for the good of both this family and us. Toward the conclusion of the great narrative, when Joseph reveals himself to his brothers, this is what he says in Genesis 45:7, "And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over the land of Egypt." What a God He is, because He's not just a God of the extraordinary, but a God of the ordinary.  He takes the ordinary actions of people despite their folly, despite their sin, and He turns it all around to fulfill His perfect plan. Three points to frame up our time as we walk through the text in Genesis 37. The first is for those who love God, all things work together for good. Second, beware the soul-rotting sin of jealousy and covetousness, and three, replace a victimhood mindset with a sovereignty mindset. So first, for those who love God, all things work together for good. We get this from Romans 8:28, and we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good for those who are called according to His purpose, and this, we see over and over in the life of Joseph and his family. The story begins in Genesis 37:1. "Jacob lived in the land of his father's sojournings, in the land of Canaan." In the previous chapter, Jacob's older brother, Esau, forsakes the land of the promised Canaan, and he goes to the land of Seir, so this acknowledges that Jacob has a right to the promised land, so Jacob settles down. In verse 2, "These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being 17 years old, was pasturing the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the songs of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father's wives, and Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father." Joseph was the second to last son, so he's number 11. Benjamin came after. Joseph lived 17, and this is a fun fact, but I think it's important for parents, in particular. The first time my oldest daughter made me an omelet, I said, "Oh, my. Finally, a little ROI. A little return on investment," but you look at Jacob, and Jacob raises Joseph for 17 years, and then he doesn't see him again until the end of the book, and then, Jacob, when he and his family moved to Egypt, he lives with Joseph for 17 years, the last 17 years of his life, but here, we see conflict between the sons of Joseph's older sons. The fact that there were bad things to report on shouldn't come as a surprise. We've already learned that they had significant behavior issues, sin, et cetera. Reuben, the oldest, slept with his father's concubine. Simeon and Levi slaughtered the Shechemites because of their sister's disgrace, so these were hard, rough, and reckless men, that were the older brothers of Joseph. Would this endear him to his older brothers, that he's bringing a bad report about them to his dad? No. Of course not. They would consider him a tattletale or a snitch. The word for brothers here is used 21 times in the text keyword, but there's dramatic irony every time the word's used because though outwardly, these men were brothers, but inwardly, spiritually, they were the furthest from the truth, so Joseph's bad report reflects badly on all of them, the brothers because they were bad things to say, and Joseph because he chose to say them. So we see resentment smoldering in the hearts of the brothers of Joseph, and we're only at verse 2. In verse 3, "Now, Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age, and he made him a robe of many colors." Favoritism had been a generational sin in Jacob's family. If you remember Isaac preferred Esau over Jacob, and if you remember, Rebecca loved Jacob more than Esau, and recall that Jacob loved Rachel and her children more than Leah and her offspring, and Jacob probably could not even help his feelings of favoritism because Joseph was the son of Rachel. She had passed already, but she was his never-forgotten first love, and Joseph had been born late in life after many years of frustration. Also, along with all of this, Joseph seems to be free from the sins of his older brothers, which was a source of solace and joy to his father. Nevertheless, Jacob's blatant favoritism was unconscionable. The lifelong hurt inflicted by his own father's favoritism should have made him weary even a hint of not being even-handed with his children, and he made him a robe of many colors, so not only did everyone already know this, but now, everyone sees that Joseph is the one who's loved most, through this public mark of Jacob's greater affection. So it doesn't surprise us that his brothers hated him, even more after the father lavished his gift on them. Quick word to parents, fathers in particular, fathers, don't be as stupid as Jacob was. Very simple lesson here. "Don't exasperate your children," the apostle Paul says. One of the ways that children can be exasperated is if you love one more than the others. How do I do this? I do it like this. I equally favor each of them, so I tell them when they're one-on-one, I was like ... I have four daughters. I tell them, "You're my favorite. Don't tell the others," but it's okay 'cause I say it to all four, so that's fine. The point is we got to love our children equally, uniquely, yes. We, uniquely, parents need to know our children's hearts, how they're wired, et cetera, but equally, we are to love them. Genesis 37:4, "But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him." So young Joseph's sudden appearance, in his distinctive robe, ignites their hatred, so he's alienated from them. They can't even speak civilly to him. The robe inflames their burning rage. They loathed his presence. Insult to injury, Joseph gets a few dreams, and he decides to share them. Verse 5, "Now, Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more. He said to them, 'Hear this dream that I have dreamed. Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright, and behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.' His brothers said to him, 'Are you indeed to reign over us, or are you indeed to rule over us?' So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words." So fuel here is added to the relational strife in the form of these Joseph-exalting dreams. Was he excited about the dream? Of course, he was. He was so full of the dream. He was compelled to pour it our to his brothers, tactless, insensitive perhaps. The brothers had no difficulty interpreting. They know exactly what he's trying to say. They don't believe it, of course, and what was the expected reaction from him? What did he expect from them? We don't know, but they respond with hatred. Verse 9, "Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, 'Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars were bowing down to me.'" Repetition here in the book of Genesis when it comes to dreams, repetition is a sign of certainty, so Joseph, when he interprets the dreams of Pharaoh, later on in the book, in Genesis 41:32, it says, "And the doubling of Pharaoh's dream means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about." So Joseph knows this God communicating to him. In the second dream, for him sealed the matter. God would sovereignly bring this to pass, and that perhaps was the reason why he found the audacity to share with his family the content. His father loves him, and his father has been doting upon him, but even his father rebukes him at this point. This is verse 10. "And when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, 'What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?' And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind." To his credit, even though Jacob rebukes his son, he didn't dismissed the dream, as the brothers did. He knew Revelation when he saw it and when he heard it, so he keeps the matter in mind. Without the dream, there would be no Joseph story. Without the dream, his brothers just hate him for the robe, but God does send the dream, and He sends two of them, and because of the dreams, Joseph can't, but share the dreams with his brothers, which sets the whole story in motion, that God sovereignly sealed and ensured the rejection of young Joseph. Do you see what that tells us? It reveals that any of us, who follow God, will live a life that will sometimes get very tangled. At times, complications will arise from our own sin, as with Joseph, or from the sin of those around us, and we live in this world that is fallen. People around us are fallen, and this world is caught in a web of sin, and it constantly casts you webs, but we know that amidst life complexities, God's creative power is at work to do us good. This is true when we get sick. This is true when we have trouble with our children, our grandchildren, when professional problems engulf us. We have the providence of God, a God who sustains our souls and all of life, perpetually working good. This is a truth to learn because life is not going to get easier, from this moment, friends. Your life is not going to get easier. With every coming day, as you get older, as we get older, with every day, it seems sometimes that the crosses that God entrusts to us get bigger, and God promised us, "If you want to follow Me, you got to deny self and take up your cross?" In fact, the more you follow God, the more complicated life will become, because your life's cores will buck against this world. So what are we to do here? Take heart that God is at work in our lives to do us good because we belong to Him, so rest your soul in that and submit yourself to Him in great processes of life and follow Him. Second is, "Beware of the soul-rotting sin of jealousy and covetousness." This is Genesis 37:11. "His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind." This entire story of the 12 sons and their animosity and eventual reconciliation begins with God, making a clear distinction between Joseph and the other brothers, thus, the significance of the dream. Joseph got the dream, the others did not. Here's a fact of life, and one perhaps that we struggle with in one way or another as the brothers struggled with. God does not treat us all the same. No. He does not give us all the same things. He does not give us all the same favor. He does not give us all the same blessings. Some Christians are smarter than others. Some are better-looking, more athletic, more successful financially, marry to lovelier and more impressive spouses, some have better jobs than others, some have higher-achieving children, some have better health and live longer lives. Some people seem to step from one victory, one triumph to another, and others never seem to be able to escape the long reach of trouble, only sometimes of their own making. Even among Christians, for someone it seems they're just naturally wired to be better Christians. Some are naturally sweeter, some are naturally more patient. The rest of us got to work a lot harder, so you look at this and you're like, "It's not fair. This isn't fair." Well, we learned this through Jonah, we learned this last week. "No, no, no, grace isn't fair." Of course it's not fair because no one earns grace. Grace is unmerited favor. Samuel Eliot Morison, the American historian and writer, he puts it like this. He says, "Life is like a card game. God deals a deck, and He gives some a strong hand and some a weak hand, and some people with a strong hand, they squander, and some people, the weaker hand, they play to the best of their ability and do well," but if a great hand is dealt and a great hand is played well, it's unbeatable, and Joseph was dealt a great hand, a mom and a dad that absolutely love him, and his father, I think made a lot of mistakes with the older sons, and by the time he gets to 11, he's like, "I think I got this," but then, he messes up with the favoritism part, but God chooses Joseph for prominence. He chooses him for power. He puts him in the position of the Egyptian core, and so the brothers have some ... They got to decide what to do. Clearly, this younger brother is blessed in a unique way. How are we going to respond? And they respond with jealousy and covetousness, and they respond with the resentment and bitterness at Jacob, at Joseph, and even at God, and they tried to resist God's will, which obviously is futile. In fact, everything they did, every evil motion, every evil act only served to fulfill God's plan. We must recognize that the way in which the Lord gives to others things that He has not given to us is an opportunity for us to step back and say, "What is grace? What is the principle of grace?" Paul would later ask, "What do you have that you have not received? Who makes you to differ?" Well, it's God, of course, who gives us what we have. If God wishes to give one of His children something He has not given you, what is that to you? Everything He gives, He gives in defiance of the fact that we don't deserve anything, except for His punishment. And who are you to tell the Almighty and your heavenly Father how to run His own family? We're called to put on humility, right? The root of all sin is pride, and I will say that if you have been given less than others, entrusted with less to steward, well, then your path of humility is a little easier than theirs. Listen to some of the wisest Christians before us about goals. Thomas A. Kempis says, "Desire to be unknown." Jeremy Taylor says, "O, teach me to love to be concealed." Archbishop Leighton says, "Be ambitious to be unknown." Augustine says, "if you ask me what the first thing in religion is, I should reply the first, the second, and third thing is humility." Alexander Moody Stuart, "There is not a humble heart in all the world that the high God is not dwelling in." Pascal, "Without humility, all our other virtues are but vices." Joseph, you do get a little hint of arrogance here. Yeah, he's dressed better than everyone else. By the way, when you're dressed nice, you know there's something there, and so you walk on a ... There is a little arrogance. There's arrogance in his speech, the dreams he could not wait for the brothers to hear. Gentlemen, do you see what's ... And how long did the Lord take to humble Joseph? His path to humility was so much harder, in many ways, than his brothers. If God wishes to exalt Joseph, that was God's doing, and it's our duty to acknowledge that it's His right to do so, and so adore God's wisdom and sovereignty. Verse 12, "Now, his brothers went to pasture their father's flock near Shechem, and Israel said to Joseph, 'Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem? Come, I will send you to them.' And he said to him, 'Here I am,' so he said to him, 'Go now, see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock, and bring me word.' So he sent him from the Valley of Hebron, and he came to Shechem." A path, a journey of about 50 miles, or it definitely took a significant time, and so he gets to ... By the way, before he gets to Shechem ... I'll give you a little backstory. So you know the backstory where his brothers can't stand him, but the other backstory about Shechem is the Shechemites can't stand the sons of Jacob, because his two older sons went in after their sister was disgraced, and they slaughtered a bunch of the Shechemites, so they're in peril and the father wants to know, "Okay, how are they?" By the way, this is a tall ask for Joseph. Joseph knows, "My brothers hate me. I'm going to a dangerous place. This is going to take a long time," and all we hear from him, when his father gives him this duty, all we hear is, "Here I am," so he's presented as diligent, as hard-working as an obedient son, even doing an unpleasant bidding. Verse 15, when he's at Shechem, "And a man found him, wandering in the fields, and the man asked him, 'What are you seeking?' 'I'm seeking my brothers,' he said. 'Tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock,' and the man said, 'They've gone away, for I heard them say,' 'Let's go to Dothan,' so Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan." So Dothan is another 14 miles that he's got to travel further, and here too, is a hidden hand of divine providence of the careful reader, is to know and to ponder Joseph, it says, "Is wandering in the fields." How long was he wandering? I don't know, but probably a significant time for it to even be mentioned he's wandering around. Perhaps, he feels like he's wasting time. Perhaps it feels like it's all aimless. "What am I doing here, Lord?" "Why am I stuck in this field?" Well, this is how the providence of God often works in our daily lives. You'll have a job to do, you'll get to a place, and here, he knows he's wasting time. It's a waste of time. It's aimless, and it's brought from the perspective of the story had he not taken this little hiatus at Shechem, had he not paused there, he would not have gotten to Dothan in time to coincide with the caravan of the Ishmaelite traders. So we see God pauses him on purpose. If he were not paused, the brothers would've killed him, instead of selling him into slavery, and this is what the scripture teaches, that often, in our lives, God works through the ordinary details, and if we are not paying attention, we miss the lessons. Scripture teaches that every single moment of life is supercharged with significance, because every piece of it is falling through the fingers of your heavenly Father. One of the biggest fallouts of living in a secular society, where people just don't acknowledge that there is a transcendence, supernatural, sovereign God over us, who cares about us and cares about the details of our lives, one of the things that we miss in this culture, where we don't believe that God is over all and in all and through all, we miss the purpose of just everyday life. We miss the purpose-filled infusion of God in everyday life, and I think that's why a lot of people are bored. Perhaps you in your daily walk with the Lord, you feel this boredom, this ennui sometimes, because you don't realize that God is working every single detail for your good, so we are to pay attention to the details of our lives, knowing that God is sovereign. Verse 18, "They saw him from afar, and before he came near to them, they conspired against him to kill him." They recognized him from his distinctive robe, and now, they hatch a plan. Verse 19, "They said to one another, 'Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then, we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him, and we'll see what will become of his dreams.'" Dreamer here obviously is used sarcastically. They would prove his dreams wrong by killing him. They want to throw him into a pit, which was a cistern hewn out of rock for the storage of water, found all throughout. Israel served as an excellent dungeon, and they wanted not just to kill him, but to kill him in the most dishonorable way to kill him, and throw his body in the cistern, where he would not be buried. Genesis 37:21, "But when Reuben heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying, 'Let us not take his life,' and Reuben said to them, 'Shed no blood. Throw him into this pit here in the wilderness, but do not lay a hand on him, that he might rescue him out of their hand to restore him to his father.'" Reuben, now, we learned in the previous chapters, if you read, he had fallen from his father's favor, because he had an affair with Bilhah, and he couldn't further afford anymore animosity or from his dad, so he knows he's going to have to bear the responsibility, so he steps into rescue his brother seemingly. In verse 23, "So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that he wore, and they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty, there was no water in it." We're only left to imagine Joseph's response. How did he respond? Did he scream? Was he terrified? On Genesis 42:21, the brothers recollect exactly how Joseph responded. "Then, they said to one another, 'In truth, we are guilty concerning our brother. In that, we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us, and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.'" By God's grace, their posture of heart changed toward the end, but what was their posture of heart at this moment, after beating him, stripping him, mocking him? It says in verse 25, "Then, they sat down to eat, and looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites, coming from Gilead, and their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh on their way to carry down to Egypt." We see callousness, we see heartless barbarity as they sit down to eat the meal that Joseph had brought them from their father. Verse 26, "Then, Judah said to his brothers, 'What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh,' and his brothers listened to him." So Judah is right after Reuben, and was he trying to save his brother placate his own conscience, make a little profit? We're not told, but we see that God does use this situation to save Joseph's life. Verse 28, "Then, Midianite traders passed by, and they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt." So Joseph was sold to a non-covenant people. The brothers had disposed of Joseph and his dreams, or so they thought. Verse 29, "When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit, he tore his clothes and returned to his brothers and said, 'The boy is gone, and I, where shall I go?'" Oh, Reuben knows the agony that his father is going to experience. He asked his brothers, "What do we do? What do I do?" And the only response from them is silence. Verse 31, "And they took Joseph's robe and slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood." This real irony here, Jacob had deceived his father by taking his brother's clothes and used a goat in order to deceive his dad. Jacob's youthful sins come full circle, his deceit. His deceit comes back to bite him. In verse 32, "They sent the robe of many colors and brought it to their father and said, 'This, we have found. Please identify whether it is your son's robe or not,' and he identified it and said, 'It is my son's robe. A fierce animal has devoured him. Joseph is without doubt torn to pieces.'" Verse 34, "Then Jacob tore his garments and put sackcloth on his loins and mourned for his son many days, and all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, 'No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.' And thus, his father wept for him." Conventional grieving lasted a week for a child or a parent. For Moses, it was a period of a month. Jacob refused to be comforted and promised here to continue mourning. We see the titanic hypocrisy in the sons. They're attempting to comfort their father in the death of his favorite son when they knew very well he wasn't dead and what had happened. Verse 36, "Meanwhile, the Midianites had sold him in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard." Narrator reminds us that while Jacob struggled to adjust to the tragedy, Joseph was beginning a new life in Egypt at the age of 17, and this brings the point, three, replace a victimhood mindset with a sovereignty mindset, and I say it because that's the only way to understand what happened with Joseph. For this next 13 years of suffering, this is a man of God that pressed into the suffering, instead of blame-shifting and being immobilized by a victimhood mindset. Scripture teaches that God is sovereign, therefore, we are responsible. Look at Joseph. He's dragged naked from the pit, tethered to a beast of burden. He himself is probably carrying stuff all the way to the Nile, and he began the story as a robe prince in Israel, and he ends as a slave. He, of all people, had a massive case for victimhood. Why not pity himself? He was indeed pitiful. He had done nothing to deserve this. His biggest sin was he had a big mouth and he didn't know to keep it shut when he should have. And where was God in all of this? Why didn't God intervene? "God, why didn't You protect me from my brothers?" "God, why didn't you protect me from this caravan bound for Egypt? Why, why, why?" What's fascinating is Joseph takes absolute responsibility for himself in Egypt. He knows who he is, he knows who's he is, and he lives his life as you and I live ours. He had God's word guiding him, and he had God's Spirit with him, he had an imperfect understanding of life around him, he had his own besetting sins, but he knew that he was with the Lord. Joseph had ample reason for self-pity, for rage, for anger with God and revenge, and he doesn't do any of it. It's as if he forgets what lies behind, and he's ready to lean into what God was teaching. I say that because in this family, you see the victimhood mindset arise every once in a while. Jacob. Jacob had ... He could blame everybody. "Laban, you weren't righteous to me. Esau, you weren't righteous to me. My parents, you weren't righteous to me. It's all your fault." "It's all your fault," even with the brothers, Reuben. Reuben could've said it to Jacob, "My dad didn't love me." Judah could've said the same thing, "That's why I am the way I am. It's all their fault." That's a victimhood mindset. "I'm a victim of someone else's sin." Joseph could have done that. He does not. He rejects it because he believes in the sovereignty of God. "God allowed this in my life, therefore, God has purposes for it." He knew Abraham, of Abraham, his great-grandfather. He knew that God had spoken to him. Joseph believed that same promise that was handed down from Abraham and Isaac, and he knew that God is with him, that God will bless him, that God will use him. He had an immense view of God, and thus, reason that God was doing his will throughout the inscrutable drama that we see. Friends, no one will escape the will of God. No one will escape the hand of God, the rule of God, the plan and purpose of Almighty God, for children of God that comes as a great comfort, and no matter what, God is going to use all of these things in my life to bring about good, but for enemies of God, or for those of you, you're not sure if you're a child of God or an enemy of God, well, the fact that God is sovereign, no one will escape His reach or His plan should send a shiver down our spine, so what are we to do? We are to seek mercy and seek grace. As Dante puts it, "In His will is our peace." Yes. Can you say, "God, thy will be done," because thy will is good, because you are loving? Our heavenly Father orchestrates our lives moment by moment, we know His love, we know His wisdom, we know His faithfulness because we know His Son, Jesus Christ and what Jesus did for us. The love of Jesus Christ, the kindness of Christ, that's what separates Christianity from every other religion, it's that God offers us grace, and how does God offer us grace? Through both the sacrifice of Christ and His suffering that comes to us. Also, as an example, 1 Peter 2:21-25, "For to this, you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in His steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in His mouth. When He was reviled, He did not revile in return, when He suffered, He did not threaten, but continued entrusting Himself to Him who judges justly. He Himself bore our sins in His Body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness." "By His wounds, you have been healed, for you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls." If there was ever a victim, it's Jesus Christ, but even Jesus turned that tragedy into a great victory. In Christ, we see that we can be more than conquerors. The story of Joseph is incredible in many ways, but it does point to the greater Joseph, Jesus Christ. Many ways, Joseph's life is a type, a typology of Christ. Joseph was rejected by his brothers, sold into captivity, and it is through that, through the fat that he was enslaved through his suffering that his brothers are freed in the end, his brothers are saved, that reminds me of a story where Pilate has Christ right before him, and they had this traditional Passover week, where he would release a prisoner, and he says, "Do you want me to release Jesus to you?," and they said, "No." The text is clear that they had brought Christ to be crucified because they envied Him. Matthew 27:15-23, "Now, at the feast, the governor was accustomed to release for the crowd, any one prisoner whom they wanted, and they had then a notorious prisoner called Barabbas, so when they had gathered, Pilate said to them, 'Whom do you want me to release for you, Barabbas, or Jesus who is called Christ?,' for He knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered Him up. Besides, while he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, 'Have nothing to do with that righteous Man, for I have suffered much because of Him today in a dream.' Now, the chief priest and the others persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus." "The governor again said to them, 'Which of the two do you want me to release to you?,' and they said, 'Barabbas.' Pilate said to them, 'Then, what shall I do with Jesus, who is called Christ?' They all said, 'Let Him be crucified,' and he said, 'Why? What evil has He done?,' and they shouted all the more, 'Let Him be crucified!'" We worship a God who took the greatest evil that was ever done, the crucifixion of the Son of God, and He turned it into the greatest event, the greatest good that could ever be, and that's the resurrection of Jesus Christ, through which we have forgiveness of sins. So if God can take the greatest evil and turn it into the greatest good in the life of Christ and the death, burial, and resurrection, well, He can do the same thing in the life of Joseph, and we'll see He does. He takes what they meant for evil and turns it into good. In the same way, when we entrust ourselves to the Lord, He can take everything in our lives, the good, the bad, the ugly, even the sin, even the evil, and He brings it all together, and He works out His good purpose. I'll close with Romans 8:31-39, "'What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?'" "'He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?' It is God who justifies. 'Who is to condemn?' Christ Jesus is the One who died, more than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of the God, who indeed is interceding for us." "'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?' As it is written, for Your sake, we are being killed all the day long, we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. Now, in all of these things, we are more than conquerors through Him, who loved us, for I'm sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." Amen. Let us pray. Lord, we thank You for this incredible word, and we thank You for You sovereignty, and we thank You for Your grace. We thank You for taking this really miserable account of brothers who hated one of their own, sold him into captivity. We thank You for the story, where You showed that You can override even our greatest acts of evil. Lord, we come to You and we come to the cross of Christ.We repent of sin of pride, of folly. Continue to lead us in the ways of sanctification and continue to produce much fruit through us, and pray all this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Reject Victimhood

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later May 21, 2023 44:39


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry. Please visit mosaicboston.com. Lord God, we thank You for giving us the holy scriptures, and we know that the center of the holy scriptures is Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Jesus, we thank You that You lived the perfect life on our behalf, fulfilled all of the commandments of God, all the will of God perfectly, and then Lord, You went to a cross, so You were crucified on our behalf, burying the wrath of God that we deserve for our law-breaking. Then, Lord, we thank You that You didn't stay dead, but You rose victoriously over Satan's sin and death, and because of Your resurrection, You offer us salvation, You offer us both mercy and grace. Mercy in that, You do not give us the condemnation we deserve. Grace in that, You give us the righteousness of Christ, and we thank You, Lord, for Your grace. We thank You that we are saved by grace through faith. If there's anyone here who's not yet a Christian, has not had their sins forgiven, I pray today, Lord, draw them to Yourself. By the power of the Spirit, convert them, and, Lord, use this sermon series to teach us that we will never graduate from needing grace, and at some seasons in life, we do need a graduate-level grace, and if there's any one season like that now, a season of suffering, trial, tribulation, I pray be especially close to them. Show us that because of what You did with Christ, You took the greatest evil ever in the crucifixion of Christ, and You turned it into the greatest good ever, the resurrection of Christ. You can turn our evil into good as well. Bless our time in the holy scriptures, and we pray all this in the beautiful name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Today, we're excited to start a new sermon series through Genesis 37 through 50. We're entitling it Graduate Level Grace: A Study In the Life of Joseph. The idea behind this text and behind the series is we come to know the Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ when we're saved by grace through faith, but that's just a start of our relationship with the Lord, a walk with the Lord, and then often, the Lord does take us through seasons in life where it seems like we're about to embark on the next level, and with the next level, we need next-level grace. The title of the sermon today is Reject Victimhood. Why this series? It's a story about a young man, who goes from just a shepherd to a Prime Minister in 13 years, but those 13 years include a lot of suffering. We're going to learn many lessons, Lord willing, glean much wisdom about the most important things in life, the most important parts of life, family, relationships, work, prayer, vision, godliness, influence, authority, leadership, integrity, rejection, betrayal, reconciliation, forgiveness, adversity, and prosperity. A quick recap of where we find ourselves, Genesis is the book of beginnings. In the beginning, we see a personal, loving, sovereign God, who creates the universe and rules over it, and God creates humanity in His image and blesses them with the mandate, "Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and govern it, reign over it. Love God," He tells them, "And love one another, have a family, raise your children to do the same." That was God's vision for humanity, but in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve, man, humanity, wickedly rebels against God. They seek to be equal with God, and so sin introduces the reign of death in the world, but God is a good God and He doesn't leave us in our sin. To save humanity, God promises to send a Savior, who will come from the seed of Abraham to save the world. The Lord chooses a family, chooses Abraham and says, "Abraham, I'm going to bless you with a family, and through your family, I'm going to send a Savior that will bless the families of the world." Abraham, Isaac, and then Jacob. We find ourselves here in the story of Jacob. He takes us Genesis 25 through 50, half the book. He is Israel after all, the direct ancestor of the nation of Israel and the father of the 12 sons from whom would come the 12 tribes. The thing that we notice about the life of Joseph is he comes from a big, dysfunctional family, a family that's riven by jealousy and hatred. They're a covenant family with God's blessing upon them, but they're torn apart by conflict, through intermarriage with pagans, et cetera, but we see that the Lord uses Joseph and his suffering to bring this hate-filled family together, and at the end, we see the family reconciled, purified, and preserved in safety in Egypt. Look at the stories of redemption in scripture. One of the greatest is the apostle Paul. He goes from being a terrorist of the Church, a persecutor of Christians to being the apostle, the evangelist to the Gentile's incredible redemption, story of redemptive arc, but ultimately, this story of Joseph is arguably even greater of a redemptive story. The story is about how God intervenes despite the brokenness, despite the sin, despite the folly, we see His grace intervene, and He takes all of the evil, the sin, the brokenness, and He brings it all together for the good of both this family and us. Toward the conclusion of the great narrative, when Joseph reveals himself to his brothers, this is what he says in Genesis 45:7, "And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over the land of Egypt." What a God He is, because He's not just a God of the extraordinary, but a God of the ordinary.  He takes the ordinary actions of people despite their folly, despite their sin, and He turns it all around to fulfill His perfect plan. Three points to frame up our time as we walk through the text in Genesis 37. The first is for those who love God, all things work together for good. Second, beware the soul-rotting sin of jealousy and covetousness, and three, replace a victimhood mindset with a sovereignty mindset. So first, for those who love God, all things work together for good. We get this from Romans 8:28, and we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good for those who are called according to His purpose, and this, we see over and over in the life of Joseph and his family. The story begins in Genesis 37:1. "Jacob lived in the land of his father's sojournings, in the land of Canaan." In the previous chapter, Jacob's older brother, Esau, forsakes the land of the promised Canaan, and he goes to the land of Seir, so this acknowledges that Jacob has a right to the promised land, so Jacob settles down. In verse 2, "These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being 17 years old, was pasturing the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the songs of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father's wives, and Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father." Joseph was the second to last son, so he's number 11. Benjamin came after. Joseph lived 17, and this is a fun fact, but I think it's important for parents, in particular. The first time my oldest daughter made me an omelet, I said, "Oh, my. Finally, a little ROI. A little return on investment," but you look at Jacob, and Jacob raises Joseph for 17 years, and then he doesn't see him again until the end of the book, and then, Jacob, when he and his family moved to Egypt, he lives with Joseph for 17 years, the last 17 years of his life, but here, we see conflict between the sons of Joseph's older sons. The fact that there were bad things to report on shouldn't come as a surprise. We've already learned that they had significant behavior issues, sin, et cetera. Reuben, the oldest, slept with his father's concubine. Simeon and Levi slaughtered the Shechemites because of their sister's disgrace, so these were hard, rough, and reckless men, that were the older brothers of Joseph. Would this endear him to his older brothers, that he's bringing a bad report about them to his dad? No. Of course not. They would consider him a tattletale or a snitch. The word for brothers here is used 21 times in the text keyword, but there's dramatic irony every time the word's used because though outwardly, these men were brothers, but inwardly, spiritually, they were the furthest from the truth, so Joseph's bad report reflects badly on all of them, the brothers because they were bad things to say, and Joseph because he chose to say them. So we see resentment smoldering in the hearts of the brothers of Joseph, and we're only at verse 2. In verse 3, "Now, Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age, and he made him a robe of many colors." Favoritism had been a generational sin in Jacob's family. If you remember Isaac preferred Esau over Jacob, and if you remember, Rebecca loved Jacob more than Esau, and recall that Jacob loved Rachel and her children more than Leah and her offspring, and Jacob probably could not even help his feelings of favoritism because Joseph was the son of Rachel. She had passed already, but she was his never-forgotten first love, and Joseph had been born late in life after many years of frustration. Also, along with all of this, Joseph seems to be free from the sins of his older brothers, which was a source of solace and joy to his father. Nevertheless, Jacob's blatant favoritism was unconscionable. The lifelong hurt inflicted by his own father's favoritism should have made him weary even a hint of not being even-handed with his children, and he made him a robe of many colors, so not only did everyone already know this, but now, everyone sees that Joseph is the one who's loved most, through this public mark of Jacob's greater affection. So it doesn't surprise us that his brothers hated him, even more after the father lavished his gift on them. Quick word to parents, fathers in particular, fathers, don't be as stupid as Jacob was. Very simple lesson here. "Don't exasperate your children," the apostle Paul says. One of the ways that children can be exasperated is if you love one more than the others. How do I do this? I do it like this. I equally favor each of them, so I tell them when they're one-on-one, I was like ... I have four daughters. I tell them, "You're my favorite. Don't tell the others," but it's okay 'cause I say it to all four, so that's fine. The point is we got to love our children equally, uniquely, yes. We, uniquely, parents need to know our children's hearts, how they're wired, et cetera, but equally, we are to love them. Genesis 37:4, "But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him." So young Joseph's sudden appearance, in his distinctive robe, ignites their hatred, so he's alienated from them. They can't even speak civilly to him. The robe inflames their burning rage. They loathed his presence. Insult to injury, Joseph gets a few dreams, and he decides to share them. Verse 5, "Now, Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more. He said to them, 'Hear this dream that I have dreamed. Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright, and behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.' His brothers said to him, 'Are you indeed to reign over us, or are you indeed to rule over us?' So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words." So fuel here is added to the relational strife in the form of these Joseph-exalting dreams. Was he excited about the dream? Of course, he was. He was so full of the dream. He was compelled to pour it our to his brothers, tactless, insensitive perhaps. The brothers had no difficulty interpreting. They know exactly what he's trying to say. They don't believe it, of course, and what was the expected reaction from him? What did he expect from them? We don't know, but they respond with hatred. Verse 9, "Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, 'Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars were bowing down to me.'" Repetition here in the book of Genesis when it comes to dreams, repetition is a sign of certainty, so Joseph, when he interprets the dreams of Pharaoh, later on in the book, in Genesis 41:32, it says, "And the doubling of Pharaoh's dream means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about." So Joseph knows this God communicating to him. In the second dream, for him sealed the matter. God would sovereignly bring this to pass, and that perhaps was the reason why he found the audacity to share with his family the content. His father loves him, and his father has been doting upon him, but even his father rebukes him at this point. This is verse 10. "And when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, 'What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?' And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind." To his credit, even though Jacob rebukes his son, he didn't dismissed the dream, as the brothers did. He knew Revelation when he saw it and when he heard it, so he keeps the matter in mind. Without the dream, there would be no Joseph story. Without the dream, his brothers just hate him for the robe, but God does send the dream, and He sends two of them, and because of the dreams, Joseph can't, but share the dreams with his brothers, which sets the whole story in motion, that God sovereignly sealed and ensured the rejection of young Joseph. Do you see what that tells us? It reveals that any of us, who follow God, will live a life that will sometimes get very tangled. At times, complications will arise from our own sin, as with Joseph, or from the sin of those around us, and we live in this world that is fallen. People around us are fallen, and this world is caught in a web of sin, and it constantly casts you webs, but we know that amidst life complexities, God's creative power is at work to do us good. This is true when we get sick. This is true when we have trouble with our children, our grandchildren, when professional problems engulf us. We have the providence of God, a God who sustains our souls and all of life, perpetually working good. This is a truth to learn because life is not going to get easier, from this moment, friends. Your life is not going to get easier. With every coming day, as you get older, as we get older, with every day, it seems sometimes that the crosses that God entrusts to us get bigger, and God promised us, "If you want to follow Me, you got to deny self and take up your cross?" In fact, the more you follow God, the more complicated life will become, because your life's cores will buck against this world. So what are we to do here? Take heart that God is at work in our lives to do us good because we belong to Him, so rest your soul in that and submit yourself to Him in great processes of life and follow Him. Second is, "Beware of the soul-rotting sin of jealousy and covetousness." This is Genesis 37:11. "His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind." This entire story of the 12 sons and their animosity and eventual reconciliation begins with God, making a clear distinction between Joseph and the other brothers, thus, the significance of the dream. Joseph got the dream, the others did not. Here's a fact of life, and one perhaps that we struggle with in one way or another as the brothers struggled with. God does not treat us all the same. No. He does not give us all the same things. He does not give us all the same favor. He does not give us all the same blessings. Some Christians are smarter than others. Some are better-looking, more athletic, more successful financially, marry to lovelier and more impressive spouses, some have better jobs than others, some have higher-achieving children, some have better health and live longer lives. Some people seem to step from one victory, one triumph to another, and others never seem to be able to escape the long reach of trouble, only sometimes of their own making. Even among Christians, for someone it seems they're just naturally wired to be better Christians. Some are naturally sweeter, some are naturally more patient. The rest of us got to work a lot harder, so you look at this and you're like, "It's not fair. This isn't fair." Well, we learned this through Jonah, we learned this last week. "No, no, no, grace isn't fair." Of course it's not fair because no one earns grace. Grace is unmerited favor. Samuel Eliot Morison, the American historian and writer, he puts it like this. He says, "Life is like a card game. God deals a deck, and He gives some a strong hand and some a weak hand, and some people with a strong hand, they squander, and some people, the weaker hand, they play to the best of their ability and do well," but if a great hand is dealt and a great hand is played well, it's unbeatable, and Joseph was dealt a great hand, a mom and a dad that absolutely love him, and his father, I think made a lot of mistakes with the older sons, and by the time he gets to 11, he's like, "I think I got this," but then, he messes up with the favoritism part, but God chooses Joseph for prominence. He chooses him for power. He puts him in the position of the Egyptian core, and so the brothers have some ... They got to decide what to do. Clearly, this younger brother is blessed in a unique way. How are we going to respond? And they respond with jealousy and covetousness, and they respond with the resentment and bitterness at Jacob, at Joseph, and even at God, and they tried to resist God's will, which obviously is futile. In fact, everything they did, every evil motion, every evil act only served to fulfill God's plan. We must recognize that the way in which the Lord gives to others things that He has not given to us is an opportunity for us to step back and say, "What is grace? What is the principle of grace?" Paul would later ask, "What do you have that you have not received? Who makes you to differ?" Well, it's God, of course, who gives us what we have. If God wishes to give one of His children something He has not given you, what is that to you? Everything He gives, He gives in defiance of the fact that we don't deserve anything, except for His punishment. And who are you to tell the Almighty and your heavenly Father how to run His own family? We're called to put on humility, right? The root of all sin is pride, and I will say that if you have been given less than others, entrusted with less to steward, well, then your path of humility is a little easier than theirs. Listen to some of the wisest Christians before us about goals. Thomas A. Kempis says, "Desire to be unknown." Jeremy Taylor says, "O, teach me to love to be concealed." Archbishop Leighton says, "Be ambitious to be unknown." Augustine says, "if you ask me what the first thing in religion is, I should reply the first, the second, and third thing is humility." Alexander Moody Stuart, "There is not a humble heart in all the world that the high God is not dwelling in." Pascal, "Without humility, all our other virtues are but vices." Joseph, you do get a little hint of arrogance here. Yeah, he's dressed better than everyone else. By the way, when you're dressed nice, you know there's something there, and so you walk on a ... There is a little arrogance. There's arrogance in his speech, the dreams he could not wait for the brothers to hear. Gentlemen, do you see what's ... And how long did the Lord take to humble Joseph? His path to humility was so much harder, in many ways, than his brothers. If God wishes to exalt Joseph, that was God's doing, and it's our duty to acknowledge that it's His right to do so, and so adore God's wisdom and sovereignty. Verse 12, "Now, his brothers went to pasture their father's flock near Shechem, and Israel said to Joseph, 'Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem? Come, I will send you to them.' And he said to him, 'Here I am,' so he said to him, 'Go now, see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock, and bring me word.' So he sent him from the Valley of Hebron, and he came to Shechem." A path, a journey of about 50 miles, or it definitely took a significant time, and so he gets to ... By the way, before he gets to Shechem ... I'll give you a little backstory. So you know the backstory where his brothers can't stand him, but the other backstory about Shechem is the Shechemites can't stand the sons of Jacob, because his two older sons went in after their sister was disgraced, and they slaughtered a bunch of the Shechemites, so they're in peril and the father wants to know, "Okay, how are they?" By the way, this is a tall ask for Joseph. Joseph knows, "My brothers hate me. I'm going to a dangerous place. This is going to take a long time," and all we hear from him, when his father gives him this duty, all we hear is, "Here I am," so he's presented as diligent, as hard-working as an obedient son, even doing an unpleasant bidding. Verse 15, when he's at Shechem, "And a man found him, wandering in the fields, and the man asked him, 'What are you seeking?' 'I'm seeking my brothers,' he said. 'Tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock,' and the man said, 'They've gone away, for I heard them say,' 'Let's go to Dothan,' so Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan." So Dothan is another 14 miles that he's got to travel further, and here too, is a hidden hand of divine providence of the careful reader, is to know and to ponder Joseph, it says, "Is wandering in the fields." How long was he wandering? I don't know, but probably a significant time for it to even be mentioned he's wandering around. Perhaps, he feels like he's wasting time. Perhaps it feels like it's all aimless. "What am I doing here, Lord?" "Why am I stuck in this field?" Well, this is how the providence of God often works in our daily lives. You'll have a job to do, you'll get to a place, and here, he knows he's wasting time. It's a waste of time. It's aimless, and it's brought from the perspective of the story had he not taken this little hiatus at Shechem, had he not paused there, he would not have gotten to Dothan in time to coincide with the caravan of the Ishmaelite traders. So we see God pauses him on purpose. If he were not paused, the brothers would've killed him, instead of selling him into slavery, and this is what the scripture teaches, that often, in our lives, God works through the ordinary details, and if we are not paying attention, we miss the lessons. Scripture teaches that every single moment of life is supercharged with significance, because every piece of it is falling through the fingers of your heavenly Father. One of the biggest fallouts of living in a secular society, where people just don't acknowledge that there is a transcendence, supernatural, sovereign God over us, who cares about us and cares about the details of our lives, one of the things that we miss in this culture, where we don't believe that God is over all and in all and through all, we miss the purpose of just everyday life. We miss the purpose-filled infusion of God in everyday life, and I think that's why a lot of people are bored. Perhaps you in your daily walk with the Lord, you feel this boredom, this ennui sometimes, because you don't realize that God is working every single detail for your good, so we are to pay attention to the details of our lives, knowing that God is sovereign. Verse 18, "They saw him from afar, and before he came near to them, they conspired against him to kill him." They recognized him from his distinctive robe, and now, they hatch a plan. Verse 19, "They said to one another, 'Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then, we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him, and we'll see what will become of his dreams.'" Dreamer here obviously is used sarcastically. They would prove his dreams wrong by killing him. They want to throw him into a pit, which was a cistern hewn out of rock for the storage of water, found all throughout. Israel served as an excellent dungeon, and they wanted not just to kill him, but to kill him in the most dishonorable way to kill him, and throw his body in the cistern, where he would not be buried. Genesis 37:21, "But when Reuben heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying, 'Let us not take his life,' and Reuben said to them, 'Shed no blood. Throw him into this pit here in the wilderness, but do not lay a hand on him, that he might rescue him out of their hand to restore him to his father.'" Reuben, now, we learned in the previous chapters, if you read, he had fallen from his father's favor, because he had an affair with Bilhah, and he couldn't further afford anymore animosity or from his dad, so he knows he's going to have to bear the responsibility, so he steps into rescue his brother seemingly. In verse 23, "So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that he wore, and they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty, there was no water in it." We're only left to imagine Joseph's response. How did he respond? Did he scream? Was he terrified? On Genesis 42:21, the brothers recollect exactly how Joseph responded. "Then, they said to one another, 'In truth, we are guilty concerning our brother. In that, we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us, and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.'" By God's grace, their posture of heart changed toward the end, but what was their posture of heart at this moment, after beating him, stripping him, mocking him? It says in verse 25, "Then, they sat down to eat, and looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites, coming from Gilead, and their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh on their way to carry down to Egypt." We see callousness, we see heartless barbarity as they sit down to eat the meal that Joseph had brought them from their father. Verse 26, "Then, Judah said to his brothers, 'What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh,' and his brothers listened to him." So Judah is right after Reuben, and was he trying to save his brother placate his own conscience, make a little profit? We're not told, but we see that God does use this situation to save Joseph's life. Verse 28, "Then, Midianite traders passed by, and they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt." So Joseph was sold to a non-covenant people. The brothers had disposed of Joseph and his dreams, or so they thought. Verse 29, "When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit, he tore his clothes and returned to his brothers and said, 'The boy is gone, and I, where shall I go?'" Oh, Reuben knows the agony that his father is going to experience. He asked his brothers, "What do we do? What do I do?" And the only response from them is silence. Verse 31, "And they took Joseph's robe and slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood." This real irony here, Jacob had deceived his father by taking his brother's clothes and used a goat in order to deceive his dad. Jacob's youthful sins come full circle, his deceit. His deceit comes back to bite him. In verse 32, "They sent the robe of many colors and brought it to their father and said, 'This, we have found. Please identify whether it is your son's robe or not,' and he identified it and said, 'It is my son's robe. A fierce animal has devoured him. Joseph is without doubt torn to pieces.'" Verse 34, "Then Jacob tore his garments and put sackcloth on his loins and mourned for his son many days, and all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, 'No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.' And thus, his father wept for him." Conventional grieving lasted a week for a child or a parent. For Moses, it was a period of a month. Jacob refused to be comforted and promised here to continue mourning. We see the titanic hypocrisy in the sons. They're attempting to comfort their father in the death of his favorite son when they knew very well he wasn't dead and what had happened. Verse 36, "Meanwhile, the Midianites had sold him in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard." Narrator reminds us that while Jacob struggled to adjust to the tragedy, Joseph was beginning a new life in Egypt at the age of 17, and this brings the point, three, replace a victimhood mindset with a sovereignty mindset, and I say it because that's the only way to understand what happened with Joseph. For this next 13 years of suffering, this is a man of God that pressed into the suffering, instead of blame-shifting and being immobilized by a victimhood mindset. Scripture teaches that God is sovereign, therefore, we are responsible. Look at Joseph. He's dragged naked from the pit, tethered to a beast of burden. He himself is probably carrying stuff all the way to the Nile, and he began the story as a robe prince in Israel, and he ends as a slave. He, of all people, had a massive case for victimhood. Why not pity himself? He was indeed pitiful. He had done nothing to deserve this. His biggest sin was he had a big mouth and he didn't know to keep it shut when he should have. And where was God in all of this? Why didn't God intervene? "God, why didn't You protect me from my brothers?" "God, why didn't you protect me from this caravan bound for Egypt? Why, why, why?" What's fascinating is Joseph takes absolute responsibility for himself in Egypt. He knows who he is, he knows who's he is, and he lives his life as you and I live ours. He had God's word guiding him, and he had God's Spirit with him, he had an imperfect understanding of life around him, he had his own besetting sins, but he knew that he was with the Lord. Joseph had ample reason for self-pity, for rage, for anger with God and revenge, and he doesn't do any of it. It's as if he forgets what lies behind, and he's ready to lean into what God was teaching. I say that because in this family, you see the victimhood mindset arise every once in a while. Jacob. Jacob had ... He could blame everybody. "Laban, you weren't righteous to me. Esau, you weren't righteous to me. My parents, you weren't righteous to me. It's all your fault." "It's all your fault," even with the brothers, Reuben. Reuben could've said it to Jacob, "My dad didn't love me." Judah could've said the same thing, "That's why I am the way I am. It's all their fault." That's a victimhood mindset. "I'm a victim of someone else's sin." Joseph could have done that. He does not. He rejects it because he believes in the sovereignty of God. "God allowed this in my life, therefore, God has purposes for it." He knew Abraham, of Abraham, his great-grandfather. He knew that God had spoken to him. Joseph believed that same promise that was handed down from Abraham and Isaac, and he knew that God is with him, that God will bless him, that God will use him. He had an immense view of God, and thus, reason that God was doing his will throughout the inscrutable drama that we see. Friends, no one will escape the will of God. No one will escape the hand of God, the rule of God, the plan and purpose of Almighty God, for children of God that comes as a great comfort, and no matter what, God is going to use all of these things in my life to bring about good, but for enemies of God, or for those of you, you're not sure if you're a child of God or an enemy of God, well, the fact that God is sovereign, no one will escape His reach or His plan should send a shiver down our spine, so what are we to do? We are to seek mercy and seek grace. As Dante puts it, "In His will is our peace." Yes. Can you say, "God, thy will be done," because thy will is good, because you are loving? Our heavenly Father orchestrates our lives moment by moment, we know His love, we know His wisdom, we know His faithfulness because we know His Son, Jesus Christ and what Jesus did for us. The love of Jesus Christ, the kindness of Christ, that's what separates Christianity from every other religion, it's that God offers us grace, and how does God offer us grace? Through both the sacrifice of Christ and His suffering that comes to us. Also, as an example, 1 Peter 2:21-25, "For to this, you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in His steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in His mouth. When He was reviled, He did not revile in return, when He suffered, He did not threaten, but continued entrusting Himself to Him who judges justly. He Himself bore our sins in His Body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness." "By His wounds, you have been healed, for you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls." If there was ever a victim, it's Jesus Christ, but even Jesus turned that tragedy into a great victory. In Christ, we see that we can be more than conquerors. The story of Joseph is incredible in many ways, but it does point to the greater Joseph, Jesus Christ. Many ways, Joseph's life is a type, a typology of Christ. Joseph was rejected by his brothers, sold into captivity, and it is through that, through the fat that he was enslaved through his suffering that his brothers are freed in the end, his brothers are saved, that reminds me of a story where Pilate has Christ right before him, and they had this traditional Passover week, where he would release a prisoner, and he says, "Do you want me to release Jesus to you?," and they said, "No." The text is clear that they had brought Christ to be crucified because they envied Him. Matthew 27:15-23, "Now, at the feast, the governor was accustomed to release for the crowd, any one prisoner whom they wanted, and they had then a notorious prisoner called Barabbas, so when they had gathered, Pilate said to them, 'Whom do you want me to release for you, Barabbas, or Jesus who is called Christ?,' for He knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered Him up. Besides, while he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, 'Have nothing to do with that righteous Man, for I have suffered much because of Him today in a dream.' Now, the chief priest and the others persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus." "The governor again said to them, 'Which of the two do you want me to release to you?,' and they said, 'Barabbas.' Pilate said to them, 'Then, what shall I do with Jesus, who is called Christ?' They all said, 'Let Him be crucified,' and he said, 'Why? What evil has He done?,' and they shouted all the more, 'Let Him be crucified!'" We worship a God who took the greatest evil that was ever done, the crucifixion of the Son of God, and He turned it into the greatest event, the greatest good that could ever be, and that's the resurrection of Jesus Christ, through which we have forgiveness of sins. So if God can take the greatest evil and turn it into the greatest good in the life of Christ and the death, burial, and resurrection, well, He can do the same thing in the life of Joseph, and we'll see He does. He takes what they meant for evil and turns it into good. In the same way, when we entrust ourselves to the Lord, He can take everything in our lives, the good, the bad, the ugly, even the sin, even the evil, and He brings it all together, and He works out His good purpose. I'll close with Romans 8:31-39, "'What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?'" "'He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?' It is God who justifies. 'Who is to condemn?' Christ Jesus is the One who died, more than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of the God, who indeed is interceding for us." "'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?' As it is written, for Your sake, we are being killed all the day long, we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. Now, in all of these things, we are more than conquerors through Him, who loved us, for I'm sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." Amen. Let us pray. Lord, we thank You for this incredible word, and we thank You for You sovereignty, and we thank You for Your grace. We thank You for taking this really miserable account of brothers who hated one of their own, sold him into captivity. We thank You for the story, where You showed that You can override even our greatest acts of evil. Lord, we come to You and we come to the cross of Christ.We repent of sin of pride, of folly. Continue to lead us in the ways of sanctification and continue to produce much fruit through us, and pray all this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Outrageous Grace

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later May 14, 2023 47:12


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your grace. And in many ways, Lord, your grace is unfathomable. We can't understand it. And in many ways, your grace is scandalous. You're going to save those people after they did that? In many ways, your grace is outrageous. I pray, Lord, that you give us the grace today to humble ourselves before you recognize no one deserves grace. Grace is unmerited favor. You can't deserve it. We have it only because of the work of Jesus Christ, his life, his death, his burial, and his resurrection. Jesus, we gather here today, redeemed as your children, children of God, the Father, thanks to your sacrifice on the cross for us. Holy Spirit, come in to the space if there's anyone who is not yet reconciled with God, is not a worshiper of Yahweh, has not been saved from their sins, does not have eternal life, I pray, today, save them and show them that life is short and we are not guaranteed tomorrow and that eternity is forever. Lord, bless our time in Jonah chapter four as we look at him. And let us not stand over him in condemnation but let us learn from him. As from an older brother, he was not perfect. We are not perfect. He didn't fulfill his mission perfectly. We haven't fulfilled ours perfectly. You gave him grace, Lord, and give us much grace. We pray this in Christ's name, Amen. So, today, we're continuing our sermon series through Jonah. We're finishing it next week. We're starting a new series, our summer series through the end of Genesis 37 through 50. We're entitling it Graduate-Level Grace Study in the Life of Joseph. And we're calling it that because we're saved by grace through faith. Salvation is by grace. But growing in usefulness to the Lord, growing in usefulness and fulfilling our calling, well, that also takes grace, and that also takes faith, and that also takes a lot of work. So, we're excited for that series. Join us starting next week. Today, we're in Jonah 4. The title of the sermon is Outrageous Grace. And hopefully, you've enjoyed this little book. It's strange. It's surprising. It's convicting. It starts with Jonah. God comes to and says, "Go preach to Nineveh." Jonah flees from the presence of the Lord. It takes an unexpected detour on a boat. And God sends a storm, Jonah's thrown overboard by the repentant sailors, and then he spends three days, three nights in the belly of a great fish. Finally, and this was last week, Jonah goes. He fulfills his calling. It's incredible. He preaches unwillingly. He's the most reluctant preacher in the history of reluctant preachers. He does not want to do it. He didn't even plan the sermon. There's no points to the sermon. Just five words. Just judgments coming. And the crazy part is people got saved. The king got saved. They prayed. They fasted. And I know they're truly penitent because their priorities are in order because the king said, "We're all fasting including the cattle. Including the animals. Lord, save our souls but also save our meat. Please, Lord." They got everything in order. And Jonah 3:10 tells us when God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it. The Ninevites were ripe for the picking. The harvest was plentiful, although the worker was only one. And this should have been the end of the story. And what a perfect story. It would've been so beautiful moving from crisis to resolution, moving from Jonah's rebellion all the way to his obedience, from Nineveh's impending destruction all the way to immediate deliverance. It's the perfect narrative arc. Amen. Boom. End of chapter three. We're done. That's how it should have ended. Here's God's saving Nineveh through the witness of even the most reluctant evangelist. That's me. That's you. There's hope for him. There's hope for us. Isn't that encouraging? But that's not how it ends at all. I was thinking about this. It ends like a Russian novel. Like the Tolstoy, Dostoyev. You made me read a thousand pages to get to this ending, man. Super disappointing. That's kind of how it ends. But there's many a lesson here for us. So, today we're in Jonah 4:1-11. Would you look at the text? "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. And he prayed to the Lord and said, "Oh, Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country. That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, oh Lord, please take my life from me, for it's better for me to die than to live." And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade, until he should see what would become of the city. Now, the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head to save him from his discomfort. So, Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant so that it withered. When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, "It is better for me to die than to live." But God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" He said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die." And the Lord said, "You pity the plant for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came up, came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" Amen. This is the reading of God's holy, inherent, infallible, authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our heart. The last word of the story is cattle. That's how the book ends in the Hebrew. It's much cattle. What a disappointment this is. Jonah here is left in a worse situation, spiritually speaking, than he was when he ran from God. He's still locked in the old patterns of xenophobia and ethnic and religious superiority. He had a besetting sin that he seemed to have repented of in the belly of the fish, though that wasn't a true repentance, and here, it was subdued for the time he was preaching in Nineveh. But now, it flares up and it flares up suddenly. What kind of ending is this one? Well, it's a realistic ending. It's a realistic ending in that we need grace to be saved from our sins, from the condemnation that our sins deserve. But we also need grace to grow in our relationship with the Lord. Jonah doesn't come out being the hero of this. The book's only disappointing if you thought Jonah was the point. Jonah wasn't the point and he wasn't even the main character. God is the main character. The chapter here is composed in three great moments, beginning and then ending with an interview between God and Jonah. And between those two bookends is an enacted parable, a little object lesson about a little vine and a worm and a wind. What's going on there? While this text reveals three contradictions in Jonah's heart, and these are the points. First, contradiction is he understands grace confessed, he confesses. Grace confessed, but misunderstood. Second, providence enjoyed, but ignored. And third, love felt, but disordered. So, point one, grace confessed but misunderstood. Jonah 4:1, it, what was the it? But it. The great revival of Nineveh, you're talking about a million people, maybe 120,000 commentators say, "That's probably children. They don't know the right hand from their left." So, if there's 120,000 children, might be upwards of 600,000 to a million people. There's a lot of people. They get saved. Jonah, not only is he not exceedingly glad about it, he's exceedingly displeased. He's actually angry. What pleased God only made Jonah mad? It's strange to the point that it's inexplicable. You would think that Yahweh's chosen prophet would be thrilled to see people come to faith. Yes, pride is a sin, but there is a certain allowable sense of satisfaction about witnessing people come to faith. I can tell you just from my experience in the Christian walk, the greatest thrill is the moment you get saved. There is no greater thrill in that. When you recognize that you have been transferring from the domain of darkness, from the kingdom of light, you were a child of Satan, now you're a child of God. That right there, the greatest thrill. Right up there, I am telling you, friends, is seeing people get saved. Seeing people who are far from the Lord, pagans who want nothing to do with God, living for themselves, selfish, thinking that the world revolves around them, entitled, proud, self-righteous, everything that you and I were, are, were. And then they get saved. They see Jesus Christ and they're like, "Ah, I need grace." And they're praying. There's nothing greater than that. Jonah should have been pumped. He should have been in the city. They should have had a parade. He should have said, "Okay, the cattle. Stop fasting the cattle. We're going to have a barbecue. We're all going to enjoy the fact that there's a revive." He doesn't do any of that. What happened? Why is he back to where he started, angry at God and angry at the people of Nineveh? And in the Hebrew, it says that the repentance of Nineveh was actually evil to Jonah. It was a great evil to him. The same word here that God said, "Nineveh, there's evil there. Your evil has risen up." That same word is used to describe Jonah. Jonah's feelings are evil. Why? Because Jonah's a loyal Israelite. He's a Jew. He's a prophet of Yahweh and loyal to the northern kingdom. And the northern kingdom was long at war with Syria and Assyria to the north. And we know from the books of the Kings, that Yahweh used Assyrian aggression to weaken Syria. And so, now, Assyria is growing in strength. Nineveh is the capital of Assyria. Jonah knows if these people gets it and they get the power of God, who knows what'll happen with Israel because Israel is under judgment of God. Partially, what's happening here is God wants Israel to be jealous in that the Ninevites got saved. Maybe we should get saved. Maybe we should stop being idolatrous. But they don't. So, Jonah, he looks at these people and he is like, "They don't look like me. They don't smell like me. They don't talk like me. They're not me. These are not my people. These are my enemies. God, do you not know how bad these people are? They are degenerate to the core. They are unredeemable. God, why would you save Assyrians and then use them to bring judgment upon Israel? How can that be?" And what he doesn't understand is that God is not a territorial God. God is not just a God of one group of people or one nationality, one ethnicity. No. God has elect from all of the nations. And God's purpose is to save his elect, which includes both Jews and Gentiles and even Ninevites. Now, sadly, in Jonah's reaction, we may see our own sinful prejudices that God may choose to save some people whom we do not think he ought to save. And his grace may extend to places where we do not think he ought to extend it. And Jonah should have known better. He knew the Psalter. Psalms 145:9 says, "The Lord is good to all and his mercy is over all that he has made." So, Jonah turns what should have been a time of great celebration into a little pity party about his Jewish nationalism. His politics win out over his faith. Those people, their politics, diametrically opposed to mine, I don't want them in the people of God. I don't want them in my church. I don't want them in my community group. I don't want them in my friend group, et cetera. That's what's going on. And you see his self-justify, accusatory tone in verse two. "And he prayed to the Lord and he said, "Oh, Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee at Tarshish, for I knew that you were a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, oh Lord, please take my life from me, for it's better for me to die than to live." What's he saying? He's saying, "God, I told you this is what... God, you should have listened to me. God, you never listened to me. I told you this is what you were going to do. I knew you were going to forgive him." That's what he's become, so self-absorbed, he's wagging his finger at God. Because of this self-pity consumed with himself, he's forgotten who he's speaking to. And yet, by the way, this confession is tremendous. It's all true. Everything he says, it's all gloriously true. But it's conflicted, his little confession. It is true. But here it comes as a complaint and he is quoting scripture Exodus 34:6-7. This is how God revealed himself to Moses. "The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and fourth generation." This confession we see all throughout the Old Testament scriptures, the Book of Numbers, second Chronicles. And we see this in Nehemiah. We see this in the Psalter. This is who God is. God is a God who is gracious. He wants to forgive people and Jonah is not happy with that. He loves the idea of a loving God, loving toward him and his people. It's a precious concept when it's directed toward him. But the moment grace is turned to Israel's enemies, Nineveh. Well, now, God's grace is a problem. Now, it's a source of frustration, not a source of joy. Jonah confesses the doctrine of grace, "God, you're gracious. I knew you were. I knew you were going to be gracious." But he can't accept the reality of it. He confesses the religious part. He can't accept the reality. Confesses the theology of grace, but there's no room for the working out of the grace. In his reality, he's happy with grace as long as it's within the boundaries of his comfort levels. And friends, here, you just got to pause it in. This is a reminder. You're in Boston. Once in a while, you need a reminder. You got to get out of your heads. In your head, theology, it's all tremendous. That it doesn't make a difference in the world when you have all the perfect theology pristine in your head. It does have to take root in your heart and you can't let orthodox theology mask an unloving, unchanged heart. Jonah, man, you should have known better. You know how gracious God is. Bro, you ran from him. You wanted to die in the ocean. God says, "No." He sends the grace of a fish. It didn't feel good for three days and three nights, gastric juices, and all but whatever. You didn't die. He didn't die. He is living proof of God's grace, but he can't stand the idea of that grace being given to others. If gospel truth is something you really take pride in knowing, if you're like, "Yes, as a believer, I know the truth." But you never share it. You're not much better than Jonah. Jonah shared it only because he was forced to. He didn't have a choice. God has given us the truth and we are to take pride in knowing the truth, but it's only by grace. But if you keep it to yourself, then we're just as much as sinners as Jonah. Although Jonah is angry, he does the right thing and complains to God in prayer. So, as much as we want to knock Jonah. First of all, when he's really angry, who does he go to? He prayed. He's like, "Lord, I don't get it." He doesn't complain about God to his readers. He could have done that. And he does not curse God. He doesn't take even Yahweh's name in vain. He pours out his heart to God even when nothing made sense. A lesson in there for us. Jonah verse three of chapter four, "Therefore now, oh Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live." And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" Now, Jonah's complaint crosses the line from asking the God grant him understanding to just, "God kill me." Moses pled to die in Numbers 11, the prophet Elijah pled to die in 1 Kings 19. And I don't even want to ask, but many of us have been there. "God, I see the test before me. I see the circumstances I'm in. Kill me." And that's the easy way out, just FYI. How much easier to seek to escape life's difficulties than face the fact that God does transform us and he does sanctify us by taking us through trials, tribulations like this. What's fascinating is that God doesn't rebuke Jonah. He could have right here rebuked Jonah. He could have killed him right there. He could have rebuked him. Like, "What are you doing?" No. God asks him a question. And in this, we see God's grace, his mercy, his love, his patience, his willingness to relent his love, even for Jonah. "Jonah, is it good for you to burn with anger, to kindle the fire already within you? Look within yourself. Examine your heart. See if your anger is justified," that's what he is saying. "Art thou very much grieves," the King James version says. Jonah doesn't respond to this first question. He's still stuck in his patriotism that prevents him from loving his neighbors. Here, we need to pause and say, "Look, there's much to be learned here." Jonah has no right to be angry with God merely because of God's purposes in saving someone other than Jonah. And neither should we be angry with God when God extends his grace to those in different socioeconomic groups, cultures, ethnicities, political parties. Let's have a moment of honesty before God, shall we? What class or group of people in our society do you find it most difficult to trust, to relate to however you define that group? Maybe it's ethnically different, or economic, or educational, or professional, or political, or maybe it's more personal in that. A person that looks like that abused you or hurt you, sinned against you. So, the thought of grace for abusers, that's beyond you. Which group of people do you find at hardest to trust, to be around, to talk to, to want to know? Be honest. What if next Sunday, you are late to serve? You come in at 9:16, like 90% of service one. At 9:16 you mosey in, and that person is sitting in your assigned seat. They don't know it's your assigned seat but they should have. And they're on time because new people always are. How do you react? What happens in your heart? What if our church begins to fill up with people like that? What happens? Is there room in your heart for them? Is there room in your gospel for them? Is there room in your life for them? Would you talk to them? Would you do the hard work of building a relationship? Or is grace just for you and only of those whom you approve? That was Jonah's problem. He confessed grace. He misunderstood grace. So, God continues to teach him. This is point two, providence enjoyed, but ignored. And this is verse four of Jonah 4. "And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" See, he didn't answer. "Jonah went out of the city and sat in the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade until he should see what would become of the city. So, here is the finger of God pressing into the festering wound of Jonah's sin. And God does ask him, "Do you do well to be angry?" It's the first of three questions, "Jonah, do you actually think it's justified? Do you think your anger is justified? Do you really think that your anger is without sin?" Instead of wrestling with God's question, Jonah ignores it and goes camping. And what's he doing? He camps outside the city to the east to sit and wait." What's he waiting for? He's waiting to see if God will relent from his relenting. God said, "I'm going to punish Nineveh, condemnation, unless they repent." They repent. He relent. Jonah wants God to relent of his relenting. He wants to see the fireworks. Like Sodom and Gomorrah, like fire from heaven, brimstone. That's what he wants to see. Jonah 4:6, "Now, the Lord God," so, he's waiting, "Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah that it might be a shade over his head, to save him from his discomfort." So, Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. Three times, we see this phrase in the book, in this chapter, in verse six, seven, and eight, that God appointed as the same verb that that's used in chapter one, verse 17 when God appoints a great fish. And what it's doing is it's pointing out the absolute sovereignty of God over all of his creation. What's the vine all about? What's this plant all about? Is it an ivy? Is it a gourd? Is it a castor-oil plant? I don't know. It's pretty big and it grew rapidly and it provided shade. Why the vine? Symbolically, I don't know if it really means anything, but it shows us that it completely changed Jonah's mood. Jonah, in the beginning of the chapter, was exceedingly mad, exceedingly angry, and now he's exceedingly glad. Why? What's changed? Well, what's changed is his comfort. And so, he is sitting very comfortably. So, he's sitting. He wants to see fireworks, condemnation. He wants to see the people of Nineveh in great discomfort. That's what he wants to see. And then God sends him a little vine, a plant to comfort him. And what we see here is incredible irony that the personal comfort that Jonah receives is the absolute opposite of what he wants for Nineveh. He wants all of Nineveh to burn. He's got ringside seats and popcorn as he waits for fire and brimstone. And as he's waiting for fire and brimstone, God sends him a plant to comfort him. Now, what is God doing here? I can't wait to find out when we get to heaven. But I think what God is doing here is he's teaching him. Jonah is too blind to realize what God is doing through providence. So, verse seven. "But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant so that it withered. And when the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, "It's better for me to die then to live." For the fourth time in the book, Yahweh directly intervenes, this time, by sending a worm, completely withers the plant that Yahweh had just raised up the day before, leaving Jonah completely exposed to the sun. And then God, on top of that insult to injury, sends him a wind, a sirocco wind, which it rises quickly and raises the temperature and drops the humidity. It's unbearable. And by the way, if you take that Jonah was still alive in the fish, gastro juices, his skin was definitely damaged. This guy is in pain right now. So, he cries out, "It's better for me to die than to live. Just kill me already, God. If you're going to spare Nineveh, just kill me." So, verse nine, "And God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" And he said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die." And again, instead of rebuking Jonah, God teaches him. Asking him a version of the same question, "Jonah, are you glad I judged the plant? Are you glad I killed the plant?" And this time, Jonah actually responds to God's question. Jonah said, "Yes, I do well to be angry. Angry enough to die." Jonah's come to the end. He still expects that Yahweh will relent of his relenting, but he just can't deal with the misery of what's happening here. He's losing all perspective. We don't know the state of mind that he's in, but he just can't believe that God would extend mercy to people unworthy of it. And here we see the lesson of providence. Did Jonah know that the plant was from the Lord? Did Jonah know that there was a worm from the Lord? Did Jonah know that there was a wind from the Lord? I think he knew. I think he knew. But there were times when it's like, "I don't want to know." He enjoyed the comforts of providence. The vine goes up, he's comfortable. But he's unwilling to listen to the lessons providence is teaching. God sometimes teaches us through supernatural revelation. That's primary where we learn from holy scripture. But God does, through providence in our lives, teach us. And if we are wise, we will pay attention to the events of our lives and see what God is teaching us. Often when something bad happens, no, no, no. God has nothing to do with this. No, no, no, God's hand is sovereign. He's absolutely over everything. Often, we're too quick to run to Romans 8:28 that, "All things work together for the good of those who love him and are called to be his." Something bad happens in your life and you're. But all things will work together. Good. We are to go there and we'll learn much of that from Joseph. But we are to go to Hebrews 12 as well. And sometimes, the difficulties in our life are actually a result of God's discipline. And we are to endure hardship as discipline because God is treating us as sons and daughters, if we are wise to learn the lessons of that providence. And I say that because in Hebrews 12:11, it says, "For the moment, all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it." Meaning that you can go through discipline which is unpleasant and you never reap the harvest of righteousness because you refuse to learn the lessons. Don't be an unwise. Don't be a foolish child. The wise child, you speak to the wise child. The wise child learns. The foolish child, words are not enough. We are to be trained up by its possible. Hebrews is saying to endure the providential discipline of the Lord and not bear fruit because we weren't listening, we weren't paying attention like Jonah here. He should have stopped and said, "God, why did you send me that vine? Would it not be to expose the hypocrisy in my heart that I care about my comfort, my comfort, my body's temperature, I care about more than someone else's soul?" By the way, I can get this because my body temperature runs high and when I'm sweating, I can't think. Maybe Jonah is here, I don't know. But he is idolizing, prioritizing his comfort over everything else. And here's the lesson God is teaching us in the hard blows of frowning providence. He's teaching us that through providence, he is training us to become more effective instruments in his hands. So, Jonah didn't learn the lessons of providence. And point three, he has a love. He feels a love. Love felt, but it's disordered. So, verse 10, and the Lord said, "You pity the plant for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and all so much cattle." The truth is, Jonah had no right to the plant, did he? It was all a gift of undeserved grace. It was nothing but a misguided sense of self entitlement that made Jonah resentful that he lost something that was not even his. And what the Lord here is teaching through this question is teaching the same lesson that we see in Matthew 20. In Matthew 20, Jesus Christ tells a parable. And then the parable, so, this guy owns a vineyard, he needs day laborers. And he goes to the market, he takes some laborers, he says, "Okay, I'll pay you this amount." And he comes back three hours later, comes back three hours later, comes back. What happens is not everybody worked the same amount of time. Some of the workers worked all day, some of the workers worked just a few hours and they all got paid the same. And the guys that worked all day come up to the owner of the vineyard, they say, "That's not fair." That's not fair. They worked an hour, we worked all day in the sweat of our brow, in the heat of the day. And the owner responds by saying, "Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?" And this is exactly what's happening with Jonah. Jonah is like those workers, "I have served you all of my life. My whole family, we have served you. And God, you're going to welcome these people in and give them the same blessings you've given us?" And what God says here to Jonah is, "Jonah, I made them. I'm their God. I'm their Lord. They are mine. They depend on me. Do I not have the right to do what I want with them?" And Deuteronomy 7:6-8, "God does remind the people of Israel that he did not choose them because of anything great in them. Verse six, for you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were much more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt." It wasn't because you were greater than any of the other people, that it wasn't because you were more noble, more mighty. It wasn't because you were worthy. It was because, "I'm loving," that's what God is saying, "I don't love you because you're lovely. I love you because I'm loving." And in Christ, this is exactly what the Lord teaches us, that we do not deserve any. Christ died for us when we were yet sinners. We all deserve condemnation. We all deserve wrath. Jesus Christ died for us when we did not deserve the grace. And this understanding of grace, this is what begins to change us. I didn't deserve it. And this second, I'm receiving grace. I don't deserve this grace either. Every moment, every second, the gospel extends grace to us. And we're not doing everything we're doing for the Lord because we are trying to earn grace. No, it's all from him. It's all free. And what grace does is it reorders our loves. And this is crucial. Because a lot of people, they follow the Lord and they go to church. What you don't understand is that God doesn't want to just transform your mind with truth, he wants to transform your heart by reordering how much and what you love by reprioritizing. So, we're not wrong to love fervently our people. We're not wrong to love our comforts. We're not wrong to be patriots. But we are wrong when we put any of those things above God and above what God loves. So, what this is what God is doing with Jonah. God is saying, "Jonah, look into my heart. You love a vine more than you love people." These are image bearers of God with eternal souls. God is saying, "I love them. I love the lost. I love the nations. I love Nineveh, that great city." It's a love just glimpsed here in Jonah, we see just a glimpse of God is gracious, God relents when we repent, he does forgive. But we see the fullness of the supreme expression of the love of God on the cross of Jesus Christ. Here is God incarnate. Here is God who is gracious and merciful. Here is God on the cross, who is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. Here's a God who relents from disaster. And here he is, that same God nailed to a tree. How did you get there, God? Jesus Christ, God and, how did you get on a tree? How did you get nailed to a tree by the people that you came to save? How did that happen? Well, Jesus Christ is answering the questions, the contradictions that are within the heart of Jonah. Jonah is saying, "God, you're too just to forgive those people. No. You can't be that loving so that your love actually satisfies your justice." How does that work? He can't make sense of it. And then Jesus Christ makes all the sense of it in the world, that the way, the only reason that God can forgive us is because someone paid for our sins. The only way that God retains his justice, retains the fact that he is just. And he gets to justify, is the only way that happens is the cross of Jesus Christ. On the cross, Jesus became our sin. On the cross, Jesus absorbed the wrath of God that we deserve. Jonah wanted to see that. He wanted to see the wrath pour down on the Ninevites. He didn't get to see it. But in the sign of Jonah, that's what Jesus says, and it says the sign of Jonah. In the sign of Jonah, we do see the wrath of God poured out on Christ. Jesus died so that the Ninevites can get saved, but also the Brooklynites and the Bostonians, so that all of us can find a home in the family of God. And the measure of the love of God for the nations is ultimately in the cross of Jesus Christ. In Romans 15:8-12, "For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God's truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, and in order that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy. As it is written, "Therefore, I will praise you among the Gentiles, and sing to your name." And again, it said, "Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people." And again, "Praise the Lord, all you gentiles, and let all the peoples extol him." And again, Isaiah says, "The root of Jesse will come, even he who arises to rule the Gentiles, in him will the Gentiles hope." That's what the cross was all about, to bring into his kingdom men, women, boys, and girls, from every tribe, every language, every nation under heaven to be saved by grace through faith. And when we see people where we want to say something like, "Ah, they don't deserve grace." You got to be a reminded, of course, they don't deserve grace. No one deserves grace. That's what makes grace, grace. It's undeserved. It's for the unworthy. It's unmerited favor. What do you love more than your neighbor, that you'd put before the great need of their souls for Jesus? I think, in Boston, it's reputation. That's what I think. I think we love our reputation more than we love the souls of our neighbors. I think that's true. I've seen, I've been watching this for a while. "What are they going to think of me?" That question doesn't matter. Well, because that question's the same thing as Jonah crying out about the vine. "My comfort. I'm discomfort. I'm uncomfortable. They don't like me. I'm uncomfortable." It's the same thing. You like being liked more than you love the souls of people. And if that were not true, we'd be sharing the gospel all the time with absolutely everybody. God calls Jonah to give up his misplaced pity for himself and learn to pity the nations. He calls him to give up his misplaced love for himself, for his comforts to love like God loves, like Christ loves. This is the call to cruciform love, a love that gives and goes and serves and sacrifices for the sake of the lost. Did Jonah learn his lesson? I want Jonah chapter five. Where's chapter five? I want to know, did he learn his lesson? That he repent? That doesn't matter. That's not the real question. The real question is, will you learn the lessons that God has for us from this book? Will you give up being satisfied with knowing truth but never sharing it? Will you learn to love this great city in which we live, in which there are more than hundreds of thousands of souls, many of whom don't know Jesus Christ? These are questions that Jonah presses into us. Will we go where God is already? And where is God already? He's on mission. Our God is a missional God. Our God is a missionary God. God had one son and his son became a missionary. Someone said, "Jesus Christ came as a missionary to seek and to save that which is lost." Christopher Wright, in his book entitled The Mission of God, makes this statement, he says, "Mission was not made for the church. The church was made for mission, God's mission." Well, that's true that God has given us some missions, a great commission to go and make disciples of all nations, God's already on mission, that God is on mission, that you and I have this great privilege of joining him in that. That's part of the grace we get. And the more you know this missional God, the more you care about mission, about people through your life, through your words, through your actions coming closer to meeting Jesus Christ. Jonah, as an example to us of a very flawed man, being chosen by God and being used by God. He's sinful, he repents, and then he sins again. He's flawed in every way. And yet Jonah is the one who's preaching, converts an entire city. Is the power in the man or is the power in the message? Well, what is the book of Jonah teaches? What is the Romans teaches? Romans teaches, the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. And you should take comfort in that. If you've never shared the gospel, a lot of people don't share the gospel because they feel unworthy of it, of sharing it. If I tell people that I'm a Christian, what are they going to think about Christianity? Well, first of all, you should probably rethink a few areas of life. Second of all, man, what are we giving people? When we share the gospel, what are we giving people? Are we giving people our own righteousness? Did you die in the cross for someone's sins? Or is your righteousness going to be imputed to someone? No. Obviously, we need to live lives of integrity. But also, obviously, you're never worthy enough. The power is not in you. The power is in the Holy Spirit, as the Holy Spirit takes the gospel of Jesus Christ. As you take these words and you proclaim, "Yeah, I'm a sinner." You are a sinner. I'm a sinner. We're all sinner. We've all sinned. We've all transgressed the commandments of God. And God is holy and we all deserve condemnation for all of eternity. That's how holy he is. But God is also loving and because he's loving, he's provided a way for all of your sins to be forgiven. All you have to do, you repent of your sin, you trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, you turn from sin, you turn to him, and then you devote your life to worshiping him. And when you do, man, I'm telling you, when the power of God takes that, takes the opportunity, takes that scenario, takes your words, and people, the lights start coming on, you get addicted to it. You get so addicted to seeing people come to faith. I want everyone addicted to it. I want this whole church addicted to people coming in faith. Share the gospel. The power is not in you. The power is in the Holy Spirit and the power is in the word. Romans 9:14-16, "What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means, for He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." So, then it depends, not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy. So, huge, huge breath of, sigh of relief. You can't mess up someone else's salvation. You can't say the wrong thing and then they're like, "Oh, you said the wrong thing. So, now, I'm not going to get..." God does the saving. You can't even get in the way. But what I'm saying is there's a huge blessing in sharing the gospel and being used by God. Under the new covenant wherein God extends his saving mercy beyond Israel to the ends of the earth, the principle that God saves whom he will becomes even more clear. And he does it. The power resides in the message. Revelation 7:9-17 of vision, "After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb." And all the angels were standing around the throne, around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God saying, "Amen. Blessing glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen." "Should I not pity Nineveh, that great city?" Oh, my God. Lord, would you pity Boston, this great city? "Should I not pity Boston, that great city?" Lord, pity this city. And don't just pity the city in general, a lot of the city in general, Lord, there's people in my life that are far from you. Lord, you've poured out your pity on me. Lord, show your pity to them. If you're not a Christian, if you're not sure of where you're going when you die, if you're not sure of your relationship with the Lord, if you are not a worshiper of God, of Jesus Christ, well, turn to God today. A couple passages from Isaiah, Isaiah 45:22-23, "Turn to me," the words of the Lord, "And be saved, all the ends of the earth. For I am God, and there is no other. By myself I have sworn, from my mouth has gone out in righteousness, a word that shall not return. To me, every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance." And Isaiah 55:6-7, "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near, let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God for he will abundantly pardon." Amen. Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for this great message from the book of Jonah that points to a greater Jonah. Jesus Christ, Jesus, we thank you in the same way that Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. You were the heart of the earth and yet you rose from the dead, and we thank you for that. And Lord, Jesus, we pray, continue to strengthen our souls, and give us the power of the Holy Spirit and continue to build up your church. And Lord, we do pray for a revival upon this great city. Draw many to yourself and use us in the process. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Outrageous Grace

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later May 14, 2023 47:12


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your grace. And in many ways, Lord, your grace is unfathomable. We can't understand it. And in many ways, your grace is scandalous. You're going to save those people after they did that? In many ways, your grace is outrageous. I pray, Lord, that you give us the grace today to humble ourselves before you recognize no one deserves grace. Grace is unmerited favor. You can't deserve it. We have it only because of the work of Jesus Christ, his life, his death, his burial, and his resurrection. Jesus, we gather here today, redeemed as your children, children of God, the Father, thanks to your sacrifice on the cross for us. Holy Spirit, come in to the space if there's anyone who is not yet reconciled with God, is not a worshiper of Yahweh, has not been saved from their sins, does not have eternal life, I pray, today, save them and show them that life is short and we are not guaranteed tomorrow and that eternity is forever. Lord, bless our time in Jonah chapter four as we look at him. And let us not stand over him in condemnation but let us learn from him. As from an older brother, he was not perfect. We are not perfect. He didn't fulfill his mission perfectly. We haven't fulfilled ours perfectly. You gave him grace, Lord, and give us much grace. We pray this in Christ's name, Amen. So, today, we're continuing our sermon series through Jonah. We're finishing it next week. We're starting a new series, our summer series through the end of Genesis 37 through 50. We're entitling it Graduate-Level Grace Study in the Life of Joseph. And we're calling it that because we're saved by grace through faith. Salvation is by grace. But growing in usefulness to the Lord, growing in usefulness and fulfilling our calling, well, that also takes grace, and that also takes faith, and that also takes a lot of work. So, we're excited for that series. Join us starting next week. Today, we're in Jonah 4. The title of the sermon is Outrageous Grace. And hopefully, you've enjoyed this little book. It's strange. It's surprising. It's convicting. It starts with Jonah. God comes to and says, "Go preach to Nineveh." Jonah flees from the presence of the Lord. It takes an unexpected detour on a boat. And God sends a storm, Jonah's thrown overboard by the repentant sailors, and then he spends three days, three nights in the belly of a great fish. Finally, and this was last week, Jonah goes. He fulfills his calling. It's incredible. He preaches unwillingly. He's the most reluctant preacher in the history of reluctant preachers. He does not want to do it. He didn't even plan the sermon. There's no points to the sermon. Just five words. Just judgments coming. And the crazy part is people got saved. The king got saved. They prayed. They fasted. And I know they're truly penitent because their priorities are in order because the king said, "We're all fasting including the cattle. Including the animals. Lord, save our souls but also save our meat. Please, Lord." They got everything in order. And Jonah 3:10 tells us when God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it. The Ninevites were ripe for the picking. The harvest was plentiful, although the worker was only one. And this should have been the end of the story. And what a perfect story. It would've been so beautiful moving from crisis to resolution, moving from Jonah's rebellion all the way to his obedience, from Nineveh's impending destruction all the way to immediate deliverance. It's the perfect narrative arc. Amen. Boom. End of chapter three. We're done. That's how it should have ended. Here's God's saving Nineveh through the witness of even the most reluctant evangelist. That's me. That's you. There's hope for him. There's hope for us. Isn't that encouraging? But that's not how it ends at all. I was thinking about this. It ends like a Russian novel. Like the Tolstoy, Dostoyev. You made me read a thousand pages to get to this ending, man. Super disappointing. That's kind of how it ends. But there's many a lesson here for us. So, today we're in Jonah 4:1-11. Would you look at the text? "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. And he prayed to the Lord and said, "Oh, Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country. That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, oh Lord, please take my life from me, for it's better for me to die than to live." And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade, until he should see what would become of the city. Now, the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head to save him from his discomfort. So, Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant so that it withered. When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, "It is better for me to die than to live." But God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" He said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die." And the Lord said, "You pity the plant for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came up, came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" Amen. This is the reading of God's holy, inherent, infallible, authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our heart. The last word of the story is cattle. That's how the book ends in the Hebrew. It's much cattle. What a disappointment this is. Jonah here is left in a worse situation, spiritually speaking, than he was when he ran from God. He's still locked in the old patterns of xenophobia and ethnic and religious superiority. He had a besetting sin that he seemed to have repented of in the belly of the fish, though that wasn't a true repentance, and here, it was subdued for the time he was preaching in Nineveh. But now, it flares up and it flares up suddenly. What kind of ending is this one? Well, it's a realistic ending. It's a realistic ending in that we need grace to be saved from our sins, from the condemnation that our sins deserve. But we also need grace to grow in our relationship with the Lord. Jonah doesn't come out being the hero of this. The book's only disappointing if you thought Jonah was the point. Jonah wasn't the point and he wasn't even the main character. God is the main character. The chapter here is composed in three great moments, beginning and then ending with an interview between God and Jonah. And between those two bookends is an enacted parable, a little object lesson about a little vine and a worm and a wind. What's going on there? While this text reveals three contradictions in Jonah's heart, and these are the points. First, contradiction is he understands grace confessed, he confesses. Grace confessed, but misunderstood. Second, providence enjoyed, but ignored. And third, love felt, but disordered. So, point one, grace confessed but misunderstood. Jonah 4:1, it, what was the it? But it. The great revival of Nineveh, you're talking about a million people, maybe 120,000 commentators say, "That's probably children. They don't know the right hand from their left." So, if there's 120,000 children, might be upwards of 600,000 to a million people. There's a lot of people. They get saved. Jonah, not only is he not exceedingly glad about it, he's exceedingly displeased. He's actually angry. What pleased God only made Jonah mad? It's strange to the point that it's inexplicable. You would think that Yahweh's chosen prophet would be thrilled to see people come to faith. Yes, pride is a sin, but there is a certain allowable sense of satisfaction about witnessing people come to faith. I can tell you just from my experience in the Christian walk, the greatest thrill is the moment you get saved. There is no greater thrill in that. When you recognize that you have been transferring from the domain of darkness, from the kingdom of light, you were a child of Satan, now you're a child of God. That right there, the greatest thrill. Right up there, I am telling you, friends, is seeing people get saved. Seeing people who are far from the Lord, pagans who want nothing to do with God, living for themselves, selfish, thinking that the world revolves around them, entitled, proud, self-righteous, everything that you and I were, are, were. And then they get saved. They see Jesus Christ and they're like, "Ah, I need grace." And they're praying. There's nothing greater than that. Jonah should have been pumped. He should have been in the city. They should have had a parade. He should have said, "Okay, the cattle. Stop fasting the cattle. We're going to have a barbecue. We're all going to enjoy the fact that there's a revive." He doesn't do any of that. What happened? Why is he back to where he started, angry at God and angry at the people of Nineveh? And in the Hebrew, it says that the repentance of Nineveh was actually evil to Jonah. It was a great evil to him. The same word here that God said, "Nineveh, there's evil there. Your evil has risen up." That same word is used to describe Jonah. Jonah's feelings are evil. Why? Because Jonah's a loyal Israelite. He's a Jew. He's a prophet of Yahweh and loyal to the northern kingdom. And the northern kingdom was long at war with Syria and Assyria to the north. And we know from the books of the Kings, that Yahweh used Assyrian aggression to weaken Syria. And so, now, Assyria is growing in strength. Nineveh is the capital of Assyria. Jonah knows if these people gets it and they get the power of God, who knows what'll happen with Israel because Israel is under judgment of God. Partially, what's happening here is God wants Israel to be jealous in that the Ninevites got saved. Maybe we should get saved. Maybe we should stop being idolatrous. But they don't. So, Jonah, he looks at these people and he is like, "They don't look like me. They don't smell like me. They don't talk like me. They're not me. These are not my people. These are my enemies. God, do you not know how bad these people are? They are degenerate to the core. They are unredeemable. God, why would you save Assyrians and then use them to bring judgment upon Israel? How can that be?" And what he doesn't understand is that God is not a territorial God. God is not just a God of one group of people or one nationality, one ethnicity. No. God has elect from all of the nations. And God's purpose is to save his elect, which includes both Jews and Gentiles and even Ninevites. Now, sadly, in Jonah's reaction, we may see our own sinful prejudices that God may choose to save some people whom we do not think he ought to save. And his grace may extend to places where we do not think he ought to extend it. And Jonah should have known better. He knew the Psalter. Psalms 145:9 says, "The Lord is good to all and his mercy is over all that he has made." So, Jonah turns what should have been a time of great celebration into a little pity party about his Jewish nationalism. His politics win out over his faith. Those people, their politics, diametrically opposed to mine, I don't want them in the people of God. I don't want them in my church. I don't want them in my community group. I don't want them in my friend group, et cetera. That's what's going on. And you see his self-justify, accusatory tone in verse two. "And he prayed to the Lord and he said, "Oh, Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee at Tarshish, for I knew that you were a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, oh Lord, please take my life from me, for it's better for me to die than to live." What's he saying? He's saying, "God, I told you this is what... God, you should have listened to me. God, you never listened to me. I told you this is what you were going to do. I knew you were going to forgive him." That's what he's become, so self-absorbed, he's wagging his finger at God. Because of this self-pity consumed with himself, he's forgotten who he's speaking to. And yet, by the way, this confession is tremendous. It's all true. Everything he says, it's all gloriously true. But it's conflicted, his little confession. It is true. But here it comes as a complaint and he is quoting scripture Exodus 34:6-7. This is how God revealed himself to Moses. "The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and fourth generation." This confession we see all throughout the Old Testament scriptures, the Book of Numbers, second Chronicles. And we see this in Nehemiah. We see this in the Psalter. This is who God is. God is a God who is gracious. He wants to forgive people and Jonah is not happy with that. He loves the idea of a loving God, loving toward him and his people. It's a precious concept when it's directed toward him. But the moment grace is turned to Israel's enemies, Nineveh. Well, now, God's grace is a problem. Now, it's a source of frustration, not a source of joy. Jonah confesses the doctrine of grace, "God, you're gracious. I knew you were. I knew you were going to be gracious." But he can't accept the reality of it. He confesses the religious part. He can't accept the reality. Confesses the theology of grace, but there's no room for the working out of the grace. In his reality, he's happy with grace as long as it's within the boundaries of his comfort levels. And friends, here, you just got to pause it in. This is a reminder. You're in Boston. Once in a while, you need a reminder. You got to get out of your heads. In your head, theology, it's all tremendous. That it doesn't make a difference in the world when you have all the perfect theology pristine in your head. It does have to take root in your heart and you can't let orthodox theology mask an unloving, unchanged heart. Jonah, man, you should have known better. You know how gracious God is. Bro, you ran from him. You wanted to die in the ocean. God says, "No." He sends the grace of a fish. It didn't feel good for three days and three nights, gastric juices, and all but whatever. You didn't die. He didn't die. He is living proof of God's grace, but he can't stand the idea of that grace being given to others. If gospel truth is something you really take pride in knowing, if you're like, "Yes, as a believer, I know the truth." But you never share it. You're not much better than Jonah. Jonah shared it only because he was forced to. He didn't have a choice. God has given us the truth and we are to take pride in knowing the truth, but it's only by grace. But if you keep it to yourself, then we're just as much as sinners as Jonah. Although Jonah is angry, he does the right thing and complains to God in prayer. So, as much as we want to knock Jonah. First of all, when he's really angry, who does he go to? He prayed. He's like, "Lord, I don't get it." He doesn't complain about God to his readers. He could have done that. And he does not curse God. He doesn't take even Yahweh's name in vain. He pours out his heart to God even when nothing made sense. A lesson in there for us. Jonah verse three of chapter four, "Therefore now, oh Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live." And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" Now, Jonah's complaint crosses the line from asking the God grant him understanding to just, "God kill me." Moses pled to die in Numbers 11, the prophet Elijah pled to die in 1 Kings 19. And I don't even want to ask, but many of us have been there. "God, I see the test before me. I see the circumstances I'm in. Kill me." And that's the easy way out, just FYI. How much easier to seek to escape life's difficulties than face the fact that God does transform us and he does sanctify us by taking us through trials, tribulations like this. What's fascinating is that God doesn't rebuke Jonah. He could have right here rebuked Jonah. He could have killed him right there. He could have rebuked him. Like, "What are you doing?" No. God asks him a question. And in this, we see God's grace, his mercy, his love, his patience, his willingness to relent his love, even for Jonah. "Jonah, is it good for you to burn with anger, to kindle the fire already within you? Look within yourself. Examine your heart. See if your anger is justified," that's what he is saying. "Art thou very much grieves," the King James version says. Jonah doesn't respond to this first question. He's still stuck in his patriotism that prevents him from loving his neighbors. Here, we need to pause and say, "Look, there's much to be learned here." Jonah has no right to be angry with God merely because of God's purposes in saving someone other than Jonah. And neither should we be angry with God when God extends his grace to those in different socioeconomic groups, cultures, ethnicities, political parties. Let's have a moment of honesty before God, shall we? What class or group of people in our society do you find it most difficult to trust, to relate to however you define that group? Maybe it's ethnically different, or economic, or educational, or professional, or political, or maybe it's more personal in that. A person that looks like that abused you or hurt you, sinned against you. So, the thought of grace for abusers, that's beyond you. Which group of people do you find at hardest to trust, to be around, to talk to, to want to know? Be honest. What if next Sunday, you are late to serve? You come in at 9:16, like 90% of service one. At 9:16 you mosey in, and that person is sitting in your assigned seat. They don't know it's your assigned seat but they should have. And they're on time because new people always are. How do you react? What happens in your heart? What if our church begins to fill up with people like that? What happens? Is there room in your heart for them? Is there room in your gospel for them? Is there room in your life for them? Would you talk to them? Would you do the hard work of building a relationship? Or is grace just for you and only of those whom you approve? That was Jonah's problem. He confessed grace. He misunderstood grace. So, God continues to teach him. This is point two, providence enjoyed, but ignored. And this is verse four of Jonah 4. "And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" See, he didn't answer. "Jonah went out of the city and sat in the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade until he should see what would become of the city. So, here is the finger of God pressing into the festering wound of Jonah's sin. And God does ask him, "Do you do well to be angry?" It's the first of three questions, "Jonah, do you actually think it's justified? Do you think your anger is justified? Do you really think that your anger is without sin?" Instead of wrestling with God's question, Jonah ignores it and goes camping. And what's he doing? He camps outside the city to the east to sit and wait." What's he waiting for? He's waiting to see if God will relent from his relenting. God said, "I'm going to punish Nineveh, condemnation, unless they repent." They repent. He relent. Jonah wants God to relent of his relenting. He wants to see the fireworks. Like Sodom and Gomorrah, like fire from heaven, brimstone. That's what he wants to see. Jonah 4:6, "Now, the Lord God," so, he's waiting, "Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah that it might be a shade over his head, to save him from his discomfort." So, Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. Three times, we see this phrase in the book, in this chapter, in verse six, seven, and eight, that God appointed as the same verb that that's used in chapter one, verse 17 when God appoints a great fish. And what it's doing is it's pointing out the absolute sovereignty of God over all of his creation. What's the vine all about? What's this plant all about? Is it an ivy? Is it a gourd? Is it a castor-oil plant? I don't know. It's pretty big and it grew rapidly and it provided shade. Why the vine? Symbolically, I don't know if it really means anything, but it shows us that it completely changed Jonah's mood. Jonah, in the beginning of the chapter, was exceedingly mad, exceedingly angry, and now he's exceedingly glad. Why? What's changed? Well, what's changed is his comfort. And so, he is sitting very comfortably. So, he's sitting. He wants to see fireworks, condemnation. He wants to see the people of Nineveh in great discomfort. That's what he wants to see. And then God sends him a little vine, a plant to comfort him. And what we see here is incredible irony that the personal comfort that Jonah receives is the absolute opposite of what he wants for Nineveh. He wants all of Nineveh to burn. He's got ringside seats and popcorn as he waits for fire and brimstone. And as he's waiting for fire and brimstone, God sends him a plant to comfort him. Now, what is God doing here? I can't wait to find out when we get to heaven. But I think what God is doing here is he's teaching him. Jonah is too blind to realize what God is doing through providence. So, verse seven. "But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant so that it withered. And when the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, "It's better for me to die then to live." For the fourth time in the book, Yahweh directly intervenes, this time, by sending a worm, completely withers the plant that Yahweh had just raised up the day before, leaving Jonah completely exposed to the sun. And then God, on top of that insult to injury, sends him a wind, a sirocco wind, which it rises quickly and raises the temperature and drops the humidity. It's unbearable. And by the way, if you take that Jonah was still alive in the fish, gastro juices, his skin was definitely damaged. This guy is in pain right now. So, he cries out, "It's better for me to die than to live. Just kill me already, God. If you're going to spare Nineveh, just kill me." So, verse nine, "And God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" And he said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die." And again, instead of rebuking Jonah, God teaches him. Asking him a version of the same question, "Jonah, are you glad I judged the plant? Are you glad I killed the plant?" And this time, Jonah actually responds to God's question. Jonah said, "Yes, I do well to be angry. Angry enough to die." Jonah's come to the end. He still expects that Yahweh will relent of his relenting, but he just can't deal with the misery of what's happening here. He's losing all perspective. We don't know the state of mind that he's in, but he just can't believe that God would extend mercy to people unworthy of it. And here we see the lesson of providence. Did Jonah know that the plant was from the Lord? Did Jonah know that there was a worm from the Lord? Did Jonah know that there was a wind from the Lord? I think he knew. I think he knew. But there were times when it's like, "I don't want to know." He enjoyed the comforts of providence. The vine goes up, he's comfortable. But he's unwilling to listen to the lessons providence is teaching. God sometimes teaches us through supernatural revelation. That's primary where we learn from holy scripture. But God does, through providence in our lives, teach us. And if we are wise, we will pay attention to the events of our lives and see what God is teaching us. Often when something bad happens, no, no, no. God has nothing to do with this. No, no, no, God's hand is sovereign. He's absolutely over everything. Often, we're too quick to run to Romans 8:28 that, "All things work together for the good of those who love him and are called to be his." Something bad happens in your life and you're. But all things will work together. Good. We are to go there and we'll learn much of that from Joseph. But we are to go to Hebrews 12 as well. And sometimes, the difficulties in our life are actually a result of God's discipline. And we are to endure hardship as discipline because God is treating us as sons and daughters, if we are wise to learn the lessons of that providence. And I say that because in Hebrews 12:11, it says, "For the moment, all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it." Meaning that you can go through discipline which is unpleasant and you never reap the harvest of righteousness because you refuse to learn the lessons. Don't be an unwise. Don't be a foolish child. The wise child, you speak to the wise child. The wise child learns. The foolish child, words are not enough. We are to be trained up by its possible. Hebrews is saying to endure the providential discipline of the Lord and not bear fruit because we weren't listening, we weren't paying attention like Jonah here. He should have stopped and said, "God, why did you send me that vine? Would it not be to expose the hypocrisy in my heart that I care about my comfort, my comfort, my body's temperature, I care about more than someone else's soul?" By the way, I can get this because my body temperature runs high and when I'm sweating, I can't think. Maybe Jonah is here, I don't know. But he is idolizing, prioritizing his comfort over everything else. And here's the lesson God is teaching us in the hard blows of frowning providence. He's teaching us that through providence, he is training us to become more effective instruments in his hands. So, Jonah didn't learn the lessons of providence. And point three, he has a love. He feels a love. Love felt, but it's disordered. So, verse 10, and the Lord said, "You pity the plant for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and all so much cattle." The truth is, Jonah had no right to the plant, did he? It was all a gift of undeserved grace. It was nothing but a misguided sense of self entitlement that made Jonah resentful that he lost something that was not even his. And what the Lord here is teaching through this question is teaching the same lesson that we see in Matthew 20. In Matthew 20, Jesus Christ tells a parable. And then the parable, so, this guy owns a vineyard, he needs day laborers. And he goes to the market, he takes some laborers, he says, "Okay, I'll pay you this amount." And he comes back three hours later, comes back three hours later, comes back. What happens is not everybody worked the same amount of time. Some of the workers worked all day, some of the workers worked just a few hours and they all got paid the same. And the guys that worked all day come up to the owner of the vineyard, they say, "That's not fair." That's not fair. They worked an hour, we worked all day in the sweat of our brow, in the heat of the day. And the owner responds by saying, "Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?" And this is exactly what's happening with Jonah. Jonah is like those workers, "I have served you all of my life. My whole family, we have served you. And God, you're going to welcome these people in and give them the same blessings you've given us?" And what God says here to Jonah is, "Jonah, I made them. I'm their God. I'm their Lord. They are mine. They depend on me. Do I not have the right to do what I want with them?" And Deuteronomy 7:6-8, "God does remind the people of Israel that he did not choose them because of anything great in them. Verse six, for you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were much more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt." It wasn't because you were greater than any of the other people, that it wasn't because you were more noble, more mighty. It wasn't because you were worthy. It was because, "I'm loving," that's what God is saying, "I don't love you because you're lovely. I love you because I'm loving." And in Christ, this is exactly what the Lord teaches us, that we do not deserve any. Christ died for us when we were yet sinners. We all deserve condemnation. We all deserve wrath. Jesus Christ died for us when we did not deserve the grace. And this understanding of grace, this is what begins to change us. I didn't deserve it. And this second, I'm receiving grace. I don't deserve this grace either. Every moment, every second, the gospel extends grace to us. And we're not doing everything we're doing for the Lord because we are trying to earn grace. No, it's all from him. It's all free. And what grace does is it reorders our loves. And this is crucial. Because a lot of people, they follow the Lord and they go to church. What you don't understand is that God doesn't want to just transform your mind with truth, he wants to transform your heart by reordering how much and what you love by reprioritizing. So, we're not wrong to love fervently our people. We're not wrong to love our comforts. We're not wrong to be patriots. But we are wrong when we put any of those things above God and above what God loves. So, what this is what God is doing with Jonah. God is saying, "Jonah, look into my heart. You love a vine more than you love people." These are image bearers of God with eternal souls. God is saying, "I love them. I love the lost. I love the nations. I love Nineveh, that great city." It's a love just glimpsed here in Jonah, we see just a glimpse of God is gracious, God relents when we repent, he does forgive. But we see the fullness of the supreme expression of the love of God on the cross of Jesus Christ. Here is God incarnate. Here is God who is gracious and merciful. Here is God on the cross, who is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. Here's a God who relents from disaster. And here he is, that same God nailed to a tree. How did you get there, God? Jesus Christ, God and, how did you get on a tree? How did you get nailed to a tree by the people that you came to save? How did that happen? Well, Jesus Christ is answering the questions, the contradictions that are within the heart of Jonah. Jonah is saying, "God, you're too just to forgive those people. No. You can't be that loving so that your love actually satisfies your justice." How does that work? He can't make sense of it. And then Jesus Christ makes all the sense of it in the world, that the way, the only reason that God can forgive us is because someone paid for our sins. The only way that God retains his justice, retains the fact that he is just. And he gets to justify, is the only way that happens is the cross of Jesus Christ. On the cross, Jesus became our sin. On the cross, Jesus absorbed the wrath of God that we deserve. Jonah wanted to see that. He wanted to see the wrath pour down on the Ninevites. He didn't get to see it. But in the sign of Jonah, that's what Jesus says, and it says the sign of Jonah. In the sign of Jonah, we do see the wrath of God poured out on Christ. Jesus died so that the Ninevites can get saved, but also the Brooklynites and the Bostonians, so that all of us can find a home in the family of God. And the measure of the love of God for the nations is ultimately in the cross of Jesus Christ. In Romans 15:8-12, "For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God's truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, and in order that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy. As it is written, "Therefore, I will praise you among the Gentiles, and sing to your name." And again, it said, "Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people." And again, "Praise the Lord, all you gentiles, and let all the peoples extol him." And again, Isaiah says, "The root of Jesse will come, even he who arises to rule the Gentiles, in him will the Gentiles hope." That's what the cross was all about, to bring into his kingdom men, women, boys, and girls, from every tribe, every language, every nation under heaven to be saved by grace through faith. And when we see people where we want to say something like, "Ah, they don't deserve grace." You got to be a reminded, of course, they don't deserve grace. No one deserves grace. That's what makes grace, grace. It's undeserved. It's for the unworthy. It's unmerited favor. What do you love more than your neighbor, that you'd put before the great need of their souls for Jesus? I think, in Boston, it's reputation. That's what I think. I think we love our reputation more than we love the souls of our neighbors. I think that's true. I've seen, I've been watching this for a while. "What are they going to think of me?" That question doesn't matter. Well, because that question's the same thing as Jonah crying out about the vine. "My comfort. I'm discomfort. I'm uncomfortable. They don't like me. I'm uncomfortable." It's the same thing. You like being liked more than you love the souls of people. And if that were not true, we'd be sharing the gospel all the time with absolutely everybody. God calls Jonah to give up his misplaced pity for himself and learn to pity the nations. He calls him to give up his misplaced love for himself, for his comforts to love like God loves, like Christ loves. This is the call to cruciform love, a love that gives and goes and serves and sacrifices for the sake of the lost. Did Jonah learn his lesson? I want Jonah chapter five. Where's chapter five? I want to know, did he learn his lesson? That he repent? That doesn't matter. That's not the real question. The real question is, will you learn the lessons that God has for us from this book? Will you give up being satisfied with knowing truth but never sharing it? Will you learn to love this great city in which we live, in which there are more than hundreds of thousands of souls, many of whom don't know Jesus Christ? These are questions that Jonah presses into us. Will we go where God is already? And where is God already? He's on mission. Our God is a missional God. Our God is a missionary God. God had one son and his son became a missionary. Someone said, "Jesus Christ came as a missionary to seek and to save that which is lost." Christopher Wright, in his book entitled The Mission of God, makes this statement, he says, "Mission was not made for the church. The church was made for mission, God's mission." Well, that's true that God has given us some missions, a great commission to go and make disciples of all nations, God's already on mission, that God is on mission, that you and I have this great privilege of joining him in that. That's part of the grace we get. And the more you know this missional God, the more you care about mission, about people through your life, through your words, through your actions coming closer to meeting Jesus Christ. Jonah, as an example to us of a very flawed man, being chosen by God and being used by God. He's sinful, he repents, and then he sins again. He's flawed in every way. And yet Jonah is the one who's preaching, converts an entire city. Is the power in the man or is the power in the message? Well, what is the book of Jonah teaches? What is the Romans teaches? Romans teaches, the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. And you should take comfort in that. If you've never shared the gospel, a lot of people don't share the gospel because they feel unworthy of it, of sharing it. If I tell people that I'm a Christian, what are they going to think about Christianity? Well, first of all, you should probably rethink a few areas of life. Second of all, man, what are we giving people? When we share the gospel, what are we giving people? Are we giving people our own righteousness? Did you die in the cross for someone's sins? Or is your righteousness going to be imputed to someone? No. Obviously, we need to live lives of integrity. But also, obviously, you're never worthy enough. The power is not in you. The power is in the Holy Spirit, as the Holy Spirit takes the gospel of Jesus Christ. As you take these words and you proclaim, "Yeah, I'm a sinner." You are a sinner. I'm a sinner. We're all sinner. We've all sinned. We've all transgressed the commandments of God. And God is holy and we all deserve condemnation for all of eternity. That's how holy he is. But God is also loving and because he's loving, he's provided a way for all of your sins to be forgiven. All you have to do, you repent of your sin, you trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, you turn from sin, you turn to him, and then you devote your life to worshiping him. And when you do, man, I'm telling you, when the power of God takes that, takes the opportunity, takes that scenario, takes your words, and people, the lights start coming on, you get addicted to it. You get so addicted to seeing people come to faith. I want everyone addicted to it. I want this whole church addicted to people coming in faith. Share the gospel. The power is not in you. The power is in the Holy Spirit and the power is in the word. Romans 9:14-16, "What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means, for He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." So, then it depends, not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy. So, huge, huge breath of, sigh of relief. You can't mess up someone else's salvation. You can't say the wrong thing and then they're like, "Oh, you said the wrong thing. So, now, I'm not going to get..." God does the saving. You can't even get in the way. But what I'm saying is there's a huge blessing in sharing the gospel and being used by God. Under the new covenant wherein God extends his saving mercy beyond Israel to the ends of the earth, the principle that God saves whom he will becomes even more clear. And he does it. The power resides in the message. Revelation 7:9-17 of vision, "After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb." And all the angels were standing around the throne, around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God saying, "Amen. Blessing glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen." "Should I not pity Nineveh, that great city?" Oh, my God. Lord, would you pity Boston, this great city? "Should I not pity Boston, that great city?" Lord, pity this city. And don't just pity the city in general, a lot of the city in general, Lord, there's people in my life that are far from you. Lord, you've poured out your pity on me. Lord, show your pity to them. If you're not a Christian, if you're not sure of where you're going when you die, if you're not sure of your relationship with the Lord, if you are not a worshiper of God, of Jesus Christ, well, turn to God today. A couple passages from Isaiah, Isaiah 45:22-23, "Turn to me," the words of the Lord, "And be saved, all the ends of the earth. For I am God, and there is no other. By myself I have sworn, from my mouth has gone out in righteousness, a word that shall not return. To me, every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance." And Isaiah 55:6-7, "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near, let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God for he will abundantly pardon." Amen. Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for this great message from the book of Jonah that points to a greater Jonah. Jesus Christ, Jesus, we thank you in the same way that Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. You were the heart of the earth and yet you rose from the dead, and we thank you for that. And Lord, Jesus, we pray, continue to strengthen our souls, and give us the power of the Holy Spirit and continue to build up your church. And Lord, we do pray for a revival upon this great city. Draw many to yourself and use us in the process. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Preparation for the Siege of Boston

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later May 7, 2023 51:12


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Today we're thrilled to continue our series in the Book of Jonah. This is week three and next week will be our final week. Today we are continuing in the series, it's called Reluctant Believer. And again, we are engaging the fact that Jonah does present himself in many ways as a reluctant believer throughout the book, but today chapter 3 is where he is walking in tune with the Lord. And there are a lot of lessons for us to glean and take away for how we should be looking to God to prepare us for the missions that he calls us to. This is really just one of the most exciting chapters of Scripture in my mind. The Lord's used it profoundly in my life and today I will pray right now that he does the same. So let me read Jonah 3 and then I'll pray and deliver the word. Jonah chapter 3 and the full chapter, verses 1 through 10. This is the word of our Lord. "Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, 'Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.' So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days' journey in breadth. Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's journey. And he called out, 'Yet 40 days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!' And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them. "The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, 'By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish.' When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented on the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it." This is the word of our Lord. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we praise you this day for the chance to hear your word almost 3,000 years after the life of Jonah. Lord, your word still stands. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of the Lord remains forever. And today we ask that your word would go out in power as it did in the day of Jonah when he went to Nineveh. Lord, we ask that we would get to see your might at hand in the form of changed hearts, in the form of humility and contrition and repentance before you. We pray that all of us here would be inclined to look to you for grace and mercy and receive it with gladness. Holy Spirit, we pray, remind us of the specific callings that you have put on our hearts, those callings to bring you glory. Remind us of your grace if we catch ourselves and having failed in our callings. Remind us of just the ways that you have prepared us to be your servants. And Lord, I just pray, let us be faithful to your formation today through the delivery of your word. I pray these things in Jesus' name, amen. I want to begin with a question. Are you doing anything that requires you to live for a cause greater than the glory or good of yourself? Are you doing anything in life that requires you to live for a cause greater than the glory or good of yourself? I am. I recently started playing on an organized sports team for the first time in 11 years. I did the whole work too much in my mid-20s, get married, have kids, gain weight, have my first reconstructive joint surgery thing over the past decade, and now I'm back on the soccer field with the co-ed parents team for my child's elementary school. And you know what? It's a blast. It's not been a blast because I'm 35 and the average age of everyone else is 40 to 50. It's not been a blast because I'm able to get a workout in that I've been lacking. In full sincerity, I love playing on this team because in locking arms with my teammates, I'm doing something that is blatantly bigger than myself for a couple of hours in the week. I'm playing for a team and essentially it feels good and right to be forgetting myself as I join my teammates. After my first game of playing on the team, I honestly had to ask myself while just feeling good to have joined this greater unit, "Have I been doing this anywhere else in my life? Have I been working for the good of something greater than myself for a while?" And you know what? I realize that I have. I realize that actually day to day as a husband, as a dad, as a pastor, a church member, I've actually been seeking to live for many causes greater than myself as I've tried to serve faithful in each of these roles. And you know what? As hard as being a husband, dad, pastor, church member can be with this renewed perspective from playing soccer, I realized that grinding it out each day in all of these callings is the blessed life. And so why is that? Why do I see it this way? Because I know that to live for myself, for my glory, my desires, my preferences, my plans alone leads to nothing but wasting away and self-deceptions and efforts to try to numb myself to the fact that living in such a way does not satisfy. I tried that approach for five years from the start of college to a year out before I found Mosaic, and I know it doesn't deliver. How many of you have tried that before? To live for yourself for extended periods and it just does not deliver? The pain of the grind to be faithful, though it's not quite as fun as losing oneself while playing soccer on a team, is so much better than the stagnancy and stoutness that mark a life without ambition beyond one's own desires or life with ambition that is too small. So I again ask, are you doing anything that requires you to live for a cause greater than your glory or good?You see, I asked this because I'm trying to draw out something that's inherent in human nature. We were made to live for so much more as the Switchfoot early 2000 song says. Man was made to live for so much more than himself and if he doesn't do this, he gets lost and blind and rots away. The Scriptures attest to this. When God creates men and woman, he gives them a commission, Genesis 1:28, "And God blessed them and God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.'" Furthermore, when someone is saved in Christ, Jesus commands all... In Matthew 28:18-20, the Great Commission: "All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Go with therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." As humans and especially as commissioned Christians, we can't get rid of this inner calling to live for something greater than ourselves. The specific calling to live for God, our creator, to live for his purposes, his glory, the spreading of his dominion through the preaching of the gospel on this side of creation is our unique and grand calling in life. And we can't get rid of it, we can't shake it. I say to you, this is the calling that God places on the lives of all people, whether they profess to be Christian or not. And beyond the Scriptures, what's my further evidence for this? A lot of Scriptures that I can't really spell out today because it'll distract too much from Jonah 3, they tell you to simply look within your heart and you will find this out. It's something about being an image bearer of God that he has imparted part of his attributes to you, that you are going to want to live for his glory. You are going to want to make use of the skills, the gifts, the qualities, the characters, beings, the longings in your heart in this life. And that's a little spiritual, it's a little hard to flesh out with Jonah 3, but I want to just argue with it that we just know this, that we have this part of our human nature just by looking at just literature and media over the years. Look how big and successful the book and movie industries about heroes and heroines who single-handedly take on the world for a great cause are. Ask why are anti-Nazi World War II movies still being churned out like rapid fire constantly in our day? Why are superhero movies so popular? Why are action movies where The Rock, Jason Statham, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis and Sylvester Stallone just automatic ways to make a ton of money and draw big crowds? Why are so many stories like The Lord of the Rings where a little or simple man or woman like Frodo takes on a tremendous force of evil against all odds, so popular? The answer is that as much as modern, post-modern and India authors and artists try to badmouth these stories and write these narratives out of the human story, they can't. There's something in the heart of the narrative of these one-man army stories, of the underdog stories that appeals to our heart. We can't shake the call to do something great in life. We can't prevent our hearts from being stirred and amazed at the stories of one man taking up great tasks because it's written on our hearts that we must do so ourselves. What does this have to do with our passage today? It has everything to do with it. What takes place in our passage? One guy, one man, a prophet of God, Jonah, with a really shaky track record, in a short moment of wholehearted obedience goes to a great city and God uses his simple message to inspire the most sincere and astonishing revival recorded in all of Scripture. Just think, they didn't even let their... They clothed their animals in sack cloth and ashes. They had their animals fast, not just the people, not just the king and the nobles. There's true humility and contrition with the hope that God would relent of the disaster. The most unbelievable part about the Book of Jonah is not that Jonah is swallowed by a great fish and then spit up on the shore. It's that the great city of Nineveh turns from its evil ways and true contrition and turns to God for mercy. This city great in every way, in size and riches, in population and architecture and security. It had these great walls. In reputation and culture, in military might and wickedness. The people were known in history for cutting off the noses of their captured enemies, skinning them alive, placing their skins on the walls when they captured their city. This great city and its king, its nobles, its people is brought to its knees in sack cloth and ashes before the Lord by the efforts of one man. Jonah's seize and conquering of Nineveh is none other than the classic story of good conquering evil, God conquering Satan, a man carrying out the duty that all men were created to do by God. Just like being on a team has reminded me, just like all the classic hero stories and blockbuster movies do, Jonah's conquering of Nineveh should pull out of all of us that which is inherent in our nature. It should pull out the desire to live for the greatest cause in the universe; to live for the spreading of the rule and reign of the kingdom of God. When we look at this story, it should inspire us. So think about how God can use us in this great city of Boston to think about how we can be more than conquerors for Christ here, to think about how we can take down the giants that are in this land. We should truly believe that through hiding God's training and call in our lives, we can bring this great city perhaps pound for pound, person per person, the most influential city in the world except where it matters most to its knees before God. Today we study Jonah 3 with the intention to identify how God prepares his servants to accomplish much more than they should, to identify how God is preparing us for the seize and conquering of Boston. So how does God prepare his servants for this great service? That's what I want to talk about today as we look at the text. And I say persistent calling, generous grace, strategic planning, giving of power and suffering. Said differently, how's God trying to fight the cynicism that is built up in your heart as an adult, as you've sought to only build your own kingdom or preserve your small cup of peace? Persistent calling, generous grace, strategic planning, giving of power, suffering. So persistent calling. How's God prepare his... How does he prepare his servants for great service? Persistent calling. Jonah 3:1 says, "Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time." This is one of the most encouraging pieces of Scripture, encouraging verses in all of Scripture. How many of you need to hear this right now after walking out the door and saying something to your spouse or your child or your roommate that did not honor them as an image bearer of God as you're trying to rush here today? By nature, as I mentioned, God sends and calls. He doesn't claim or save his children and leave them to stay where they are. He tells them to go and claim dominion for him. With Jonah, there's no ounce of pity toward him after he spent his time in the fish. He doesn't give him a week off. God knows that after his experience in the fish, he has Jonah's heart and he calls him to go to Nineveh a second time. This is encouraging to me. What it tells us is that mission isn't for the elite, it's not for the well-rested, it's not for those who have all authority, have all the resources. It's not for those who are professionally trained, seminary educated, overflowing with resources. It's for anybody who claims that they are the Lord's. God by nature is ascending and calling God. Those who genuinely know God know that he will come to you not just a second time but a third and fourth and beyond to press you into action to get you to stop living for yourself and live for him. Live for the spreading of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Live for other people. God constantly pushes and plows us out of our comfort zones in an effort to ask us, "When do you really want to start learning who I am? I live to make things new, to change people, to renew them from the inside out. You can never find out who I am if you're never in action dependent upon me." God never sucks us in, swallows us without spitting us out and telling us to go. Think of God's calling of Abraham in Genesis 12. "Now the Lord said to Abram, 'Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.'" He never saves without calling you to save. He never blesses someone without calling them to be a blessing. And the only way you can be a blessing is if you go, you leave, you leave your comfort zone, your safe space and you get out. God calls us to leave that which is familiar in order to engage that which is foreign and scary and requires vulnerability. It takes these things to bless others. You can't be a Christian and not expect to be on mission without engaging the own mess of your heart and engaging the mess of the hearts of the people that you're trying to serve and love and be used by God to convert. If you don't follow God's call, it's not just that you can't be a blessing and be used by God, it's that it prevents you from becoming like God. Many more years after Abraham, 700-plus years after Jonah, God the Son, Jesus Christ, left the ultimate safety zone, the throne of God's radiant and infinite glory in heaven to take on flesh. And when he was on earth, he faced every tension, every challenge, every hardship that was possible. He spoke, he engaged the world in order to reach out to us and in doing so, he created many followers but many enemies. The same thing we experience in being Christian here in the city. And yet in doing all of this, by humbling himself, Jesus exalted himself. By losing himself, he found himself. The very opposite of what happens when someone lives for themselves. Just thinking about how God just persistently calls us. Just practical application. Just ask yourself, are you living for something beyond the maintenance of your schedule, your work, your reputation, day in and day out? Are there any places where you are extending yourself, making yourself uncomfortable for God and for others, for the sake of saving others, for the sake of encouraging other Christians? Through your giving, through your service, are you actually sacrificing to God? Can you really convince yourself or others that you're doing this? There's a lot of Christians who are like Monday morning quarterbacks. They go to church on Sunday. They have a little analysis of the word, whether it essentially entertained them or not, and then they live as if they're not Christian throughout the week. They're not on mission. We need to be on mission. The great hope when we look at Jonah, the reluctant prophet, the reluctant believer is that we don't really need to be talented, we don't need to be that smart. We don't have to have the gifts, the resources, but we need to give God our will, our willingness to submit to his call. And when we do, he will always accomplish his intended purposes and make us new in the process. Until you understand this, you're going to live life in a fake reality. It's going to be the size of your own head and you're going to be out of touch with who he is and who you are and who you are created to be. And so we have to receive God's call like Jonah, even if we reject it like he did the first time. Next, how do God prepare his servants to do great things? He gives them generous grace. Still talking about verse 1 here, "Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time." Those of you who know the story so far of Jonah, that God's calling of Jonah, again, you know that it doesn't make any sense. Why? Because Jonah didn't obey the first time. God called him, he disobeys, he sins, he goes in the complete opposite direction that God wants him to. Jonah let God down. And I don't know about you. If you think of God's tactic right here, it just doesn't make sense. When you look at... If you're at war, do you go and find an officer who's just been court marshaled to go and place him at the front and be the commander at the most important battle? That's essentially what God does here in sending Jonah to the great city of Nineveh. Jonah's second call and second commissioning is given purely out of the grace of God. He's recommissioned not because of his own merit, but because of the undeserved favor, merit, the undeserved kindness of God. You see, the way that God works to accomplish his great works is completely contradictory to the ways of the world. According to the world's practices, who does the most important tasks? We know very clearly here who that is. It's the Harvard grads, the MIT grads, those who are the richest, the strongest, the most beautiful, the most deserving on paper. But God doesn't work like that. Here he chooses to work through the foolishness of men through a guy like Jonah to show the world his power. He works through Jonah's racist and prejudice tendencies. Jonah talks about this. Jonah really does not want Nineveh to be saved because they're the arch rival of his home nation Israel. He does not want God to give them his mercy. In the New Testament, who does God work through? He works through disciples, fishermen, laborers. And who does he give leadership, a seeming position of leadership among them? Peter the fisherman, the guy who betrayed him three times on the eve of his crucifixion. God gives generous grace over and over again to his servants. He works through people who are saved by grace and powered by grace. People who have no heirs about them because they've already acknowledged to themselves to be complete failures in their own right. People saved by grace who've cried out like Jonah, "Salvation belongs to the Lord," as he did at the end of chapter 2. They're humbled. They don't take up tasks and callings to prove themselves, hide their insecurities or to show themselves to be something that they're not. They take up great responsibilities with a pure desire to honor God out of thanksgiving for his forgiving of them, out of thanksgiving for calling him to his work. And so this is as a Christian, as a servant of God, we have to receive his generous grace over and over. And do you know it? First of all, do you know that the alternative, what you really deserve on the opposite end of being called by God to do his work is wrath? Have you run to him and received forgiveness by looking to the cross, looking to the blood of Jesus Christ to get peace with him, to avoid eternal condemnation, to avoid judgment? Are you powered by grace or are you powered by self-ambition? And that's something that a lot of Christians here will say, empowered by grace, but you really have to ask this question to yourself multiple times. If you're the kind of person drawn to the top programs, drawn to the schools, drawn to the industries and big companies of Boston, are you driven by grace? Are you driven to act in every area of your life out of thankfulness for what God has done for you? And the hard part about being Christian is you have to receive it daily. In my marriage, one of the hardest things is... We've been married nine years and now it's just been hundreds of times where I know that the only way forward is to receive grace from my wife. The only way forward is to just accept that she needs to forgive me for my sin. There's nothing I can do to justify what I did, but I've got to stop. I've got to receive it. I've got to praise God that I have a woman that is happy to give me grace, happy to work forward together just simply out of the kindness of her heart in the same way that God forgives me for my sin. And as Christians, when we're called on task, we're stretched to our limits. We're at the end of our widths. It reveals the inner insecurities that remain in us. It reveals the bad habits and tendencies that are sinful part of the old man that don't honor God. And when we're out on mission, we just need to constantly come back to him and go to the cross of Jesus Christ. So Jonah in this moment, he knows that coming right out at the belly of the fish. Furthermore, how does God prepare his servants for great work? With strategic planning. Verse 2 says, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you." So God gives Jonah strategy. What is that strategy? He sends Jonah into the city, he sends him into Nineveh, the capital city of Assyria, the great power of the north of Israel. This is the same strategy that the Apostle Paul used on his mission trips. The man who God used more powerfully than any other person, aside from Jesus Christ himself to spread the gospel. He went to cities to spread the gospel. And why does God employ the strategy? People in the city throughout history, they've always been a little more open to change. The nature of the city, the engagement with different kinds of people, trades and challenges, forces them to think more deeply about issues and seek solutions regarding life, death, heaven, hell, and human flourishing. I can attest to this. I'm from the suburbs. I've worked on staff at a suburban church before and I can tell you... Ask Mosaic staff. I can tell you just for hours and hours all the good things about Southeast Pennsylvania, suburban Philadelphia life, I can go on and on. It's a special place in the world. But as much as I love the people there and confess that they could teach us city dwellers a lot about contentment and resting in the Lord, living there, working there, being on mission there, it was really hard to get them to think about beyond what they're going to eat at their big Sunday family dinner or beyond the big game that afternoon. The best part about living in the city is that people press hard for answers, press hard for truth and don't avoid tensions. Further, God sends Jonah to the city and gets his disciples to employ a city-centered strategy because life primarily runs through the city. Commerce primarily runs through the city. Immigrants arrive at the city and live in the city for a generation or two before considering moving out as the city provides a safe net. Media, theater, publications are still centralized in the city and their material is spread from there. The city is the heart from which all of the lifeblood of a land flows. And that's Boston. That's our pride. Our license plates say, "Spirit of America." That's not for Massachusetts, you know that's Boston saying that. That's so true when you think of the power of the institutions, power of the companies, the power that young 20-somethings and beyond get when they work on companies that you see touch the global market. The city is the heart from which all of the lifeblood of a land flows. And as Christianity, just one point to think about is, as Christianity gripped the Roman Empire and spread rapidly in the early centuries after Christ's death, those who were called pagans were the people who typically stuck their fist up to Christianity and chose to live outside of the city as it spread there in the city. The word pagan can actually mean countrymen. People who lived outside of a city, carried on with all kinds of idolatry. And again, I'm not trying to say that about modern, rural or suburban America. I will never stop feeling homesick for my place where I grew up, suburban Philadelphia, but the Book of Jonah and all of Scripture has a very clear acknowledgement of the importance of the city. Jonah 4:11 says, "And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" And that's saying people who do not know their right hand from their left is probably children. And so when you consider the amount of adults, the number probably gets to 500,000, 600,000. So God reminds Jonah of how many image bearers in this case, particularly children are there in the city. Jonah's upset about God taking away a plant at this point that gave him shade from the sun, but he does not care about the salvation of hundreds of thousands of people. And we just need to be careful that just even being residents in the city, that cynicism toward the city does not grow. We have to be careful that we don't lose heart for the image bearers of God around us. And the question is, do you care for the city? Do you actually have a heart for the city? I think as a church of people who were pent-up in small apartments for an extended time in COVID, we were left panting for space, panting for breathing. Our view of the city might have become a little more matured or nuanced, especially as transplants who just don't know a city life that well, many transplants here. We really need to pray for God to renew our hearts for this city, for Boston, for Brookline, Jamaica Plain, Cambridge. Furthermore, are you here to use the city or just get out? Or are you here because you view your time here as a person who was sent by God to be here to first and foremost do his service or work? A lot of people, the typical Mosaic person who comes for a program just says, "I'll ask these questions later. I'll think about the good of God's name in this city when I'm done my program." And I say, "Don't hesitate, engage them now." Next, God prepares his servants to do great things by the giving of power. And this is from Jonah 3:3-4. "Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days' journey in breadth. Jonah began to go into the city, going a day's journey. And he called out, 'Yet 40 days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.'" So Jonah goes into the city. The way the text describes his efforts, the focus isn't placed on the quality of the sermon. It's just eight words here in the English, five words in the Hebrew. Many think this is just a summary. There's a lot of debate. Was this his full sermon or was it just a summary of what Jonas said? I think it's more of a summary statement. I see the limited content on what Jonas says to draw us attention not to his words, it's to have us keep our attention on the power of God in this moment, how God used Jonah. Verse 5 says, "And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them." The people of Nineveh believed God. They didn't believe Jonah, they didn't hear Jonah through his sermon, they didn't hear his words. They heard God, his words. It was God, his power, which gave the people of Nineveh the ears to hear his voice, which led to their complete and wholehearted repentance, which is chronicled in more detailed verses 6 through 9. Verse 6 says, "The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes." And it says, "The word reached the king." Better translated, "The word touched the king of Nineveh." That's God's power touching even the heart of the king. So how did Jonah strike the hearts of all the people of the city and ultimately the king and the nobles? He repented in his own life and the Lord used his sermon, paired it with his power to lead the city to repentance. What does the city need more than anything? This great conversion that we see or this great repentance that we see in the city. What does the city need more than anything in Nineveh? What does it need more than anything today? Repentance before God. Individuals, heads of households, heads of state weeping for their sin before God, turning from their violent and evil ways and turning to God for mercy. The city more than anything needs more people with repentant hearts before God. Do you think that Christian, or do you agree with what you hear out there in the media? Do you ever hear modern politicians, local or nationals say that that's what the city needs? Individual repentance, a turning from sin and turning to God, a change, a true change in the hearts of people? No, it's always band-aids. It's diplomacy, negotiation, urban planning, therapy. That's what the politicians, that's what anthropologists, that's what sociologists, that's what college professors, that's what counselors say, but it's repentance before God. It's a new heart, a changed heart, a heart that does a complete 180 that stops looking for itself all the time and starts looking to God continually. So God's called children need to trust that when he sends them, he sends them in power. That's the only reason why I'm here in Boston today. I have no confidence in my own strengths. I'm a preacher because I truly believe that God gives us power. When we speak, when we spread the word faithfully, when we fight for holiness in our daily lives, he uses us in our weakness for his glory. We need to remember that. And this is what Mosaic believes. This is what has built this church. I've been blessed to see Mosaic grow from 15 people in 2011 to what it is today. And the strength of Mosaic has always been its fight to stay faithful to the word of God. And it's not because we have a website with nice design. It's not because we do have lot of young, cool, trendy, attractive people. It's because we have gathered people around the preaching of God's word and God's power has gone out as he says it would. We believe that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation to the Jew first and also the Greek. It's what everybody in the world needs to be saved to be right before God and to live a righteous and holy life going forward until Jesus returns or until they die. The local church isn't to focus its energies and resources on efforts focused on big picture systemic change and politics, but on individual soul salvation, which makes people new from inside out. God will be glorified, the city will be renewed when one person, one household at a time turns from their evil ways and turns to receive mercy from the Lord. So do you believe this? Are you expending all of your energies in all of these other areas at the cost of being faithful to the stewarding, the sanctification of your own heart? At the cost of being faithful to being present with brothers and sisters in Christ who are asking hard questions of God, of the gospel, who are asking for help and encouragement as they fight sin? For the Christian, there should be a whole recalibration of how I'm saved in Jesus. Now, how do I better invest my time to honor God, to bring glory to his name? And a lot of young people are... Sometimes that means stay there, stay where you are and really try to be a witness to God there. But if you're not accepted after faithful effort, after faithful effort, God says, "Stomp your feet off and go and find somewhere else." And so how are you actively trying to identify your calling today? And a lot of it, it begins with loving God. What did you say? Love God, love your neighbor. Are you looking to be present to serve God with the people who are physically next to you? Not the people online, not the people on social media. And even I say if you've left mom and dad and they're in a city far away, you have to be present with the people who are there in person before then. You have made the choice to actively leave them to be present somewhere else. And you either accept that and own it and be present where you are. And you still praise God. We get to call them and have FaceTime and video chats in our day. Or you say, "All right, I've got to go home. God wants me there." And so we need to be present with the people that God place in our life. We need to love God, love neighbor. Do you believe what the world needs is the gospel, is Jesus, is repentance and faithfulness before him? And it's so easy, it's such an easy offer. All people have to do is turn in faith, believe the good news, and they get the Holy Spirit, the power of God to work about a new identity rooted in him. It's the greatest deal in history. So Christians, we need to share God's word with boldness and faith, trusting that his power will go out. The God who once used the delivery of gospel to save you at some point, to convict you of your sin before him, he will send the power out when you share the gospel and try to live it out faithfully. We need to stop being ashamed. If we're in the gospel, we have what all people hear, whether rich or poor need. That's the message which brings about peace and restoration before God. So God, he gives us grace and he calls us here to go out in power. And furthermore, how does he prepare his saints for great service like he did for Jonah? And last is the suffering. God gives his servants suffering to equip them to do great things. He gives them suffering to be as powerful of a one-man army as Jonah was in this book. And I don't get this text from Jonah 3, I get it from Matthew 12:38-40, which is Jesus's analysis of this text. It says, "Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him saying, 'Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.' But he answered them, 'An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.'" Jesus is communicating here that it's out of his death that others will receive life. It's not miracles that ultimately show his power and authority and make him worthy to follow as God, but it's out of his weakness, his death, that the sufficiency of his saving power will be born, that he himself will show himself worthy of worship. Jesus was the suffering servant. It's through suffering that Jesus makes his followers good servants. A servant cannot be greater than his master. When we are saved, we are called to be formed by suffering in our service. There's no doubt that the greatest form of preparation for Jonah's ministry was his suffering, the dissent into the deep, into the abyss, a near-death experience because of his rebellion against God that he was prepared to take up this task. And why is that the case? Why is suffering a good thing? Particularly in this instance, Jonah's suffering enabled him to embody the message that he delivered to the Ninevites. What's the message that he had? What's the message of the gospel? God is both righteous and merciful. He's not just merciful. The church is really good. Modern church is really good at hitting mercy, mercy, mercy, grace, grace, grace. God is both righteous and merciful. He is holy and righteous by nature, and he cannot and will not accept anybody into his presence who is marked by sin. At the same time, he is a gracious God and merciful, slow to an anger and abounding and steadfast love and relenting from disaster toward anyone who repents of their sin and calls on the name of Jesus Christ. That was Jonah's message. That's the message of the Bible. That's the message of Jonah. That's the message of the gospel. And Jonah knew this very well. He knew of God's righteous condemnation of his sin because he was put in the belly of a fish for it. He knew of God's grace and mercy through his experience of being spit up by the fish and given a second chance at life, a second chance to do the work of God. Jonah's ministry to the Ninevites was so powerful because his life embodied the message of God's righteousness and mercy towards sinners, and that is the same of Jesus Christ. When we look to the cross, when we look at Christ's life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and ultimately his return, we see the righteousness and mercy of Jesus. Jonah, when he would've told of the judgment coming for a sin, he would've told them with all sincerity of its inevitability and reality. When he would've told them of the grace and mercy of God, he would've told them in a way that convinced them that he knew it personally. He knew this all because God allowed him to suffer. Remember chapter 2 he says, "Your waves, your breakers were cast over me in this experience in the water, in this experience in the belly of the fish." God appointed suffering is what gave Jonah the humility, gave Jonah the appreciation of grace, gave Jonah the humility to rely on the power of God in service, even in a place as wicked as Nineveh through his suffering. And he does the same with us. And just Jonah, why was his ministry so powerful? Because his life, his presence embodied the message that he delivered to the people. And I ask, is that true of you? All Christians know upon conversion, they're going to have a moment of true conversion. They're going to know that they're under the conviction of a holy God. And that strikes the fear of death, fear of hell in you. And the thing is, you can't stay there. A lot of people stay under conviction that's an old historic word before they turn and receive grace. They're there for too long and they think they just have to self-loathe and feel guilty for their sin. But no, when you feel this, when you see your sin, your folly before God, you have to look quickly and receive his mercy and find forgiveness, love, joy, freedom in him. So Christian, are you benefiting from your suffering? Are you learning in your suffering? And I press this point that it's up to us to... We have the power to decide how suffering affects us. This isn't what a lot of counselors, this isn't what the world's going to tell you. We have the choice to let suffering embitter us and paralyze us, or sharpen us and embolden us. It's all a matter of faith. When you suffered, you trust that God could be using it to better enable you to embody the message of salvation that you offer to other people, to understand just how much your savior went through for you, to understand his righteousness, his grace better, or do you harden yourself and get angry and close yourself off to him and others? So God used suffering in the life of Christ. He used it here in the life of Jonah, and he can do it in yours. To close, I just want to ask, how are you going to start living for something greater than your own glory or good today? How are you going to start living for something greater than your own glory or good today? As you ask that question, remember that to do that, God has persistently called you. He has generously offered grace time and time again. He has given you the strategy, he has given you his power, and he has blessed you with suffering to embody the message that you deliver. Let me pray. Heavenly Father, we praise you that we have this great passage of Jonah before us. We thank you for the hope that it offers to us as sojourners, as aliens living in a foreign land away from heaven, away from the fullness of your presence right now. We have this hope that you can use us, jars of clay, just weak vessels for your glorious and grand purposes. We praise you that you do not change, that we have hope that you can move here in Boston today as you once did in Nineveh. Lord, we ask that you would shine your face upon us, that you would give us grace, that you would continue to give all of us here as individuals and as a body, just great mission, great call, and great purpose, the honor to serve you and the tensions between heaven and hell. The honor to serve you as we face the thorns and thistles of life. The honor to be a part of your calling home of your children. Lord, we ask, give us eyes to see all the ways that you are forming us, training us, encouraging us, sharpening us, molding us to be more humble, more faithful, more repentant servants in your kingdom. We ask this in Jesus' name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Rock Bottom

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 30, 2023 45:27


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we thank You for the blessing of us to gather as Your people. We thank You for the holy scriptures. We thank You for Your holy people. You call them saints. You call us saints. It's not because of any righteousness in and of ourselves. We have none to commend ourself to You. We come to You only on behalf of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Lord Jesus, we thank You that you were cast away from the presence of the Father in order to provide a way for us to never be cast out. If there's anyone who is outside Your family, outside of the elect, today, draw them to Yourself by the power of the Holy Spirit. Lord, in each one of us, develop a humility, a contrition of heart, a trepidation before Your Word, the same that we see with Jonah. You gave him the gift of hitting rock bottom, and I pray that that's not what it takes for any of us. But even if anyone of us does, we thank You that You meet us there. We pray that you bless our time, the holy scriptures today, and we pray You minister to us where we are and help us take the next step in obedience of faith. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen. Today we continue our sermon series through the Book of Jonah. The title of the sermon today is Rock Bottom. Jonah, as we met last week, is a reluctant believer, he's a rebellious prophet, and on top of that, he is a resentful missionary. God comes to Jonah and says, "Go." And Jonah says, "No." Jonah runs away. He runs to Tarshish, it's the opposite direction of Nineveh. It's not that he was afraid that people in Nineveh would believe in God and have their sins forgiven, no, no, no, that they wouldn't believe. He actually feared that they would believe he hated them. He didn't think they were deserving of the Word of God. He deemed that God had made a mistake. "No, God, You have to be wrong about these people." So Jonah boards a ship bound for Tarshish, pays the fair. It's a long trip, maybe a year, would cost a small fortune. He probably sold everything he had. So he's all in on running away from God. Yahweh the Lord hurls a great storm, God never misses, and the storm threatens the ship and the lives of the crew members. The pagan sailors don't know what to do. They do everything they possibly can. They jettison the [inaudible 00:02:55], they pray to their gods, they cast lots, they confront Jonah. Finally, Jonah confesses who he is. He says, "I fear God." And last week we saw that his fear of God was very half-hearted, and he confesses to what he's done. "I'm trying to flee from the Lord, that's why the Lord has cast a storm." They toss him overboard and the storm calms. The moment Jonah's off the ship, Yahweh relents from His wrath, calms the storm, delivers the crew, and the crew actually gets saved. They repent of their sin. They turn to Yahweh because they see the power of Yahweh even working right in front of them. The prophecy of Jonah reveals that it's Yahweh's redemptive purpose to save everybody, including gentiles. This was the whole making a covenant with Israel. God wanted Israel to be missionaries in the promised land, to serve as witnesses to his holiness and righteousness to neighboring gentiles. They didn't do it in the same way that Jonah didn't do it. The lesson that we can draw from here is you can run, but with God, you can never hide, neither from God nor from His purposes. Philippians 1:6 promises us, "I'm sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ." And often God does allow us to hit rock bottom to fulfill, to complete His work in us. He doesn't just do it passively. Sometimes He actively determines it as He does with Jonah. He gives him the gift of rock bottom. Jonah wanted to literally hit rock bottom. He wanted to die. God says, "No," sends a big fish, big enough to swallow him whole. Obeying God is costly. Disobeying God is even more costly. But this book isn't about Jonah.,It's about a God that meets Jonah even at rock bottom. The book is about a God who loves us. I don't know when's the last time you meditated upon that, that God does love you and therefore God does pursue you. God does confront you. He will arrest you to awaken you, and He does this to bring us to the end of ourselves and bring us home in faith back to Him. The text here before us in Jonah 2 focuses not so much on what happens in the belly of the fish, but what happens in the heart of Jonah himself. Jonah's experiencing death itself. He's in a living tomb, perhaps even physical death. We'll get into that. If you take the sign of Jonah language, literally Jesus says, "I will send you a sign of Jonah," and then He compares a sign of Jonah to His own death, burial and resurrection. A sign of Jonah could have been that Jonah did die. We'll get into that. Either way, the miracle is that God doesn't just save this man physically, but He saves his heart and He saves his soul. Before Jonah can effectively preach repentance, he must first learn to repent himself. So that brings us to Jonah 2. Would you look at the text with me? "Then Jonah prayed to the Lord His God from the belly of the fish, saying, 'I called out to the Lord out of my distress, and He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and You heard my voice. For You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the flood surrounded me, all your waves and your billows passed over me.' Then I said, 'I am driven away from your sight, yet I shall again look upon Your holy temple.' The waters closed in over me and take my life. The deep surrounded me. Weeds were wrapped about my head. At the roots of the mountain, I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever, yet you who brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. When my life was fainting away, I remember the Lord and my prayer came to You, into Your holy temple. "Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love. But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to You, what I have vowed I will pay. Salvation belongs to the Lord. And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Joan out upon the dry land." This is the reading of God's holy, inherent, infallible, authoritative word. May He write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time, first, the merciful wrath of God's discipline. Second, the missing words from Jonah's prayer. And third, the mysterious ways of the Lord's salvation. First, the merciful wrath of God's discipline. This phrase, merciful wrath, was coined by Martin Luther to describe the fact that God does, as a loving father, often send fatherly discipline that feels severe in the lives of his children. There are times when a Christian wanders so far, backslides so far from the path of faithful obedience to God, when the virus of rebellion has spread so vigorously through our spiritual system that nothing but the merciful wrath, a wounding medicine, can cure. Sometimes God has to bring us to the end of ourselves before we're ready to turn back to Him. This is what happened with the prodigal son. It wasn't until he finds himself sitting in the muck and the filth in the pigsty, and he sees pigs eating and he actually covets their food. It says that he came to himself, he came to his senses, and then he began to make his journey home. This is what God is doing in Jonah's life. It's a merciful wrath. It's a spiritual chemotherapy on the cancer of his rebellion. It's hard, it's sore, and it's necessary. But God does actively pursue convict those whom He loves. The purpose of God's judgment on Jonah is to bring him to repentance. Look how far Jonah has gone from God in an attempt to run from God's presence. He goes down to the port to catch the ship in Tarshish, down to the hull of the ship, down into the sea. So part of God's plan was to let him go down, down, down. There are many different ways to run from God, not just getting on a ship and running in the opposite direction. Jonah was active in fleeing from God. Many of us, we do it more passively. Perhaps you work so much you don't even have time to connect with God, "God, You know why I'm working so hard." Or perhaps it's endless entertainment or perhaps it's just generally avoiding any talk about God whatsoever. This is a subject that we shall never broach, ever, ever, ever. That's how many of us live in the secular humanist in Boston. There's subjects that you do not touch in public company, but also even in our own minds. Do our minds gravitate toward God? When Jonah hits rock bottom, what's he left to do? What are we left to do when we hit rock bottom? Well, he prays. And what does he pray? What do you pray when you have nothing to say, when you don't know what to say? Well, he prays the words of God back to Him. He prays psalms from the psalter. All the words here are quotes from the [salter, at least seven different psalms he quotes, perhaps directly or perhaps he had so memorized the Word of God that when he had nothing else to do, nowhere else to turn, he meditates on the Word of God. The psalm in this chapter is a meditation on his fish belly experience. As he's marinating in gastric juices, Jonah is meditating on God's Word. This chapter is a memorialization of his desperation. He's on the brink of death or he is dead, and then he wrote this after, I don't know. But Jonah 2:1-2, "Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish, saying, 'I called out to the Lord out of my distress, and He answered me, out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and You heard my voice.'" To whom does he pray when he hits rock bottom? To the Lord, Yahweh, the covenantal, relational, loving, merciful name of God. But I don't know if you noticed, that's personal. God got personal all of a sudden. God wasn't personal. I wanted nothing to do with the presence of God, what God's telling me what to do. All of a sudden, when he's got nowhere else to go, God becomes personal. Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. Jonah 2:6, "'Yet You brought up my life from the pit, oh Lord my God.'" Well, contrast that with what he says to the sailors when he confesses his identity, Jonah 1:9, "And he said to them, 'I'm a Hebrew. I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea in the dry land.'" Did you catch that? Before he needed God, it's the God of heaven. As soon as he has nowhere else to turn, "You're my God." Well, what is that? That's just a child. He's finally awakening to the fact that he's a child of God and he needs his loving Father right now. Apparently, Jonah does not fear death. After all, he was willing to sacrifice himself to save the ship's crew. What Jonah fears is being abandoned to Sheol. He didn't know what that was going to feel like. What is the Sheol? You can spend a lot of time figuring this out, but it was an understanding of this is where you go, this is where the dead go, the place of the dead to await judgment, the final judgment. And more generally, it's the interior place of the departed. As you look at how he thinks of Sheol, look at verse six, "At the roots of the mountains, I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever, yet You brought up my life from the pit.'" So Jonah sinks to the roots of the mountain, rock bottom metaphorically. And now, alas, in the depths of the ocean abyss, the reluctant prophet desperately cries out to Lord, "O Lord my God." What got him to cry those words, O Lord my God? He thought death was it. He thought, "Okay, I don't want to do what God wants me to do. I just want to die. I don't want to die, Lord, kill me, the suicidal prop. Kill me. Kill me. And then the Lord says, "Oh, you want run for My presence? You want to experience what it feels like to not have My presence forever?" That's what the text says, "bars close upon me forever." What is God doing here? God is giving Jonah a taste of hell. Not just of death, not just of physical torture, He's giving him a taste of death, of hell, of being abandoned by God forever. And this is wounding medicine that God made Jonah fish bait, not to destroy him, but to deliver him, and deliver him not just from the storm threatening to shipwreck the vessel, but from the sin that was making a shipwreck of his life. What a sober warning this is for many of us, that when we think we are fleeing God's presence and we run and we run and we run, there might come a point where that's it. There's no more turning back. You do end up in a place called Sheol or hell or whatever you call it, a place where God's loving presence no longer exists. So Jonah here is brought to repentance. Rebellion is running from the presence of God, repentance is returning to the presence of God. So here we find this man, the most extreme of circumstances, in the belly of the fish and the depths of the sea and the jaws of death itself. And what does he do? He prays and he cries out to God. Lesson here, friends, is cry out to God wherever you are, wherever you are, however you find yourself, do not wait until you are at rock bottom. If that's what it takes, God will take you there. No, friends do not scoff this gift of salvation, this gift of forgiveness of sin, this gift of heaven instead of hell. Do not scoff at that. Look at this man of God, it took him experiencing hell to finally cry out to God. We don't need to get there. How did he get where he is? In Jonah 2:3, he acknowledges that God is sovereign, "For You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seeds, and the flood surrounded me, all your waves and your billows passed over me." How did he get there? "It was You," he says to God. Wait, I thought it was the sailors that threw him in. Well, yes, there were instruments in the sovereignly determining hands of God. The crew acted freely and out of desperation and prayerfully, but Jonah knows, "No, no God, You threw me in." The Bible frequently presents free human actions as the fulfillment of God's will with no attempt to resolve the apparent conundrum. Notice Jonas speaks of the seas, the waves, the storms as all Yahweh's possession, Yahweh formed the oceans, He controls the wind and the waves. These become Yahweh's means to both discipline and rescue the reluctant prophet. Verse five, "The waters closed in over me to take my life, the deep surrounded me, the weeds were wrapped about my head." He could feel his life fainting away, as verse seven says. It's a terrible, chilling, graphic depiction of a drowning man. He thought he was drowning. He thought his lungs were filling up with water, lungs with no oxygen, jaws closing in, and then he cries out, "God, you did it." There's two different ways. When you experience calamity in your life, you can say, "God, You did it. It's all Your fault. I'm going to blame You for the pain I feel. You are not loving, You are harsh." No, he doesn't blame God for his predicament, he says, "God, You did it, I deserve it, and this is for my good." He could say, "Lord has chastened me, and He's chastened me grievously, but not to give me over to prediction. I live, and while I live, I need to reassess my life. God has given me mercy and He's given me mercy for a reason." In 2:4, he begins to really wrestle with the heart of what it means to be abandoned by God. "Then I said, 'I'm driven away from your sight." Being driven away, another translation says to be banished. Leviticus talks about a spouse, a wife that commits adultery against her husband, the husband divorces or banishes her. As Jonah here is entombed in the belly of this great fish, he feels banished from the presence of God. He's been trying to flee from the presence of God, and God here gives him a taste of what that feels like. Hebrews 10:31, "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God." There are a couple ways of being in the hands of the living God. Jesus Christ talks about the fact that people who are Christians, the elect are children of the Father, and the Father holds us in His hands and He will never let us go. Sometimes the Lord's, the Father's hands are loving and tender and sometimes they are disciplinary and they're full of wrath. And this is the hands that Jonah fell in. Psalm 31:22, "I had said in my alarm, 'I'm cut off from your sight.' But You heard the voice of my please for mercy when I cried to You for help." So Jonah does cry out in verse five, "The waters closed in over me to take my life, the deep surrounded me, weeds were wrapped about my head," and verse six, "yet You brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God." Well, great, Jonah cries out to God, God saves him when he's meditating on the Word of God, he's repenting. But this brings us to point two, the missing words of Jonah's prayer. There's something missing. Reading Jonah's song of praise here is like listening to someone play a perfectly tuned piano, but there's one key missing. There's something missing. There's a good deal of beauty here, but that one note, and it's the note of repentance of the particular sin. There's missing lines, there's missing bars, if you will, of calling sin a sin. Jonah here has changed, praise to God, God's at work, but it's a gradual change. It comes in fits and starts like the blind man. Remember the blind man in Mark 8? Jesus restores the sight of the blind man. Jesus touches him and says, "What do you see?" And the blind man says, "I see men walking around like trees." He sees, but he doesn't see clearly yet. His vision was still in distinctive, still blurry. So what does Jesus do? He touches him again and at last he's able to see clearly. Isn't this how often God deals with us. The first time you come to the Lord, you're like, "I finally understand everything. I'm preaching next Sunday. I think I'm ready to preach the Word of God." And then little by little you begin to understand, "Oh, it's all a process. We're all in process." And some of the Lord's most important lessons, they take time and there's stages and changes that occur in our heart. Jonah has come a long way from his unbending rebellion. We get to a point where he's worshiping in the belly of a great fish, but he hasn't come far enough. He hasn't said the missing words. "Jonah, why didn't you go to Nineveh? Why didn't go to the capitol of Assyria, your arch enemy of Israel? Why didn't you go there?" "I didn't want to preach the word to them." "Why didn't you want to preach the word to them, Jonah?" "Because they might repent." "Isn't that a good thing, Jonah?" "No. No. I don't want them to repent because I don't want to call them brother or sister. I don't want to worship with them in the temple. I don't want to go back to my people and tell them, 'Hey, Israel, remember your enemies that killed you? Yeah, they're all repented and they're all going to come worship at the festivals.'" Jonah, he would get killed. No, Jonah should have repented. This should have been like verse two, "Lord, I repent for hating my enemies. Lord, I repent for hating the Ninevites." The one note that needs to be sounded loudest and longest and clearest is missing all together from this psalm is xenophobia, his prejudice that made him flee in the first place, his horror at the idea of those people becoming children of God. That's a festering sore that still remains in his heart, unaddressed, unrepented of. Look at verse seven, "When my life was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, my prayer came to You, into Your holy temple." I remembered the Lord. The reminded you of Himself very clearly. You didn't do much to remember the Lord, good sir. And then he continues in verse eight, so he's just talking to himself, I'm awesome, I remember the Lord, and then, "Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love. But I... " Do you see the contrast? "But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to You, what I have vowed I shall pay. Salvation belongs to Lord." The phrase for steadfast love here, verse eight, God is steadfast love, he's got the theology. It's the word for hesed in the Greek, covenant love, covenant mercy, a love that sends Jesus Christ to die for our sins. A love that does not spare the Son of God but freely delivers Jesus up for us all. Jesus experiences what Jonah had not experienced completely. Jesus experienced the wrath of God, the eternal wrath of God. Jesus experienced the full brunt of hell on the cross for us so that when we trusted him, repent of our sins, all our sins are forgiven, and we experience the hesed love of God, His steadfast love. It's a covenant love. It's a faithful love. It's a redeeming love of God for His chosen people. "Idolaters, Jonah says correctly, "have no share in the redeeming love of God." It's all true. But look at Jonah, he doesn't consider himself one of the idol doers. He considers himself as the one that did all the things right. "Unlike them, you see, I know who God is." There is a self-congratulatory note, a self-centeredness that still persists. It clings to his heart tenaciously. His whole problem was he did think he was better than the Ninevites. "Well, of course, God loves me. I'm Jewish, I'm part of the Jewish people. I am a prophet. Look at the spiritual pedigree of my family." He may even be hinting that God saved him because he deserves to be. "Well, of course, God saved me. God still needs me to preach to the Ninevites. That's kind of what's going on here. He thinks the outsiders are beneath God. But he is absolutely right here at the end, salvation belongs to whom? To Israel? No. Salvation belongs to whom? Salvation belongs to the Lord. That's how he ends the whole thing. What does that mean? It means that we contribute absolutely nothing to our salvation. Yes, we must exercise faith and we need to engage in repentance, but these contribute nothing to our salvation, to our justification before God the Father, to our reconciliation before God. We add absolutely nothing other than the sin that made it necessary. Salvation is of the Lord from beginning to end. If God doesn't save us, then we're not saved. That's what Jonah learned in the belly of the fish, that salvation is all from the Lord beginning to end. He kind of knew it, but now he's learned it in the crucible of trial and suffering. So we're all in a process like Jonah, it's true, that God isn't finished with him yet. And praise to be to God, He's not finished with us either. But here we do need to take a lesson from Jonah's hypocrisy that's being exposed. Christian, where is there hypocrisy in your own life? There is the Lord putting His finger on some area of inconsistency in your Christian walk, someplace where you say one thing and do the other, some dimension of you thinking orthodox words are enough to cover selfish, prideful attitudes. Do you still struggle with xenophobia or partiality, where you would rather spend time with Christians like this not Christians like that? The church is a missionary society, and we must never forget that. This is why we exist, we exist to bring glory to God and extend His praise from shore to shore. And our goal is to reach those who are far from the Lord, the other, with the gospel of grace. There is no room, if we believe in grace, if we believe that we're saved by grace through faith, then there's absolutely no place for any superiority complex. Jonah 2:10, "And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land." The Lord spoke. The Lord spoke to the fish. Next time you go fishing, you should pray, "Lord, speak to some fish to come my way." Lord speaks to fish, and when God speaks, the fish obeyed, and Jonah is delivered onto dry land. Big fish don't usually beach themselves. The fish here is Yahweh's agent and does exactly as Yahweh commands, unlike Jonah, and deposits Jonah presumably somewhere near Palestine on a beach where Jonah will be recommissioned to preach the gospel. What did Jonah look like right now? I'll leave that to your imagination. I don't think he had eyebrows, and that's enough. If a guy comes to you and preaches without eyebrows that he lost in a belly of a fish, you listen. What we need to know here is that God is a God that can resurrect, and we need to know this, that this is the heart of our faith, that you must believe in the resurrection if you are to be a Christian. Romans 10:8-13, "But what does it say? 'The word is near you, in your mouth, and in your heart,' that is the word of faith that we proclaim, 'because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart, one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the scripture says, "Everyone who believes in Him will not be put to shame." For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord as Lord of all, bestowing His riches on all who call on Him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved'" This is as simple as it gets. If you are not a Christian, you're new to Christianity, you just want to know what this is all about, this is as simple as it gets. Jesus Christ died on the cross for my sins, bearing the wrath of God that I deserve. He died, He was buried, and He was raised on the third day as proof that everything He taught was absolutely true. Now, how does that impact me? When you trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, when you believe that Jesus is Lord, and if you believe that He rose from the dead, that's all it takes, you will be saved. Saved from wrath of God, saved from being banished into a place called hell. Saved from your sin. Saved from the penalty of sin. Friend, if you're not a Christian today, don't put it off, don't put it off. Today, in your heart of hearts, pray to the Lord, "Lord, I repent of my sin, of my reluctance, of my folly, of my rebellion, of my law-breaking. Lord, I repent. Lord, I trust in You. Jesus you're king. And Jesus, I believe that You rose from the dead and I will rise from the dead one day as well." Third, the mysterious ways of the Lord's salvation, Jonah 2:9, "But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you, what I have vowed I will pay. Salvation belongs to the Lord." So salvation leads to thankful sacrifice. God, thank You for saving me. What would You have me do? This is the natural inclination of every true child of God. It's the instinct of the redeemed soul. God, what would You have me do? True repentance always involves commitment, which means now, Lord, are You telling me to do the hard things like go preach to the Ninevites. Jonah had his Nineveh, what is your Nineveh? What is the thing that God is calling you to do and you're like, "No, no, no, that's going to take too much sacrifice."? Well, true repentance always includes a desire to sacrifice. Why should I sacrifice to attain salvation? No, this is where Christianity separates itself from absolutely every other worldview or religion. No, we don't sacrifice to earn salvation. No, salvation doesn't belong to us earning. Salvation belongs to the Lord, completely, 100%. Jonah here isn't swimming in the sea saying, "God save me." There is no power for salvation. That's the picture here. All he does is cry out. All he does is pray. And yet you know what? It's an imperfect prayer. It's imperfect, but it's answered. Do you notice before we move on that the prayer Jonah prayed as he sank into the sea was imperfect, but God still answers it? This is part of the wonder of the story. Jonah, he doesn't even know what to repent of. All he does is cry out. He knows who can help him and he knows he needs help. He turns to God for rescue even though it's not a full repentance. The whole Book of Jonah comes to a conclusion, as we'll see eventually, that we're still not really sure if Jonah repent. His heart hasn't changed as he prays, and God condescends to hear him anyway. Jonah is a hard-hearted, stubborn man, but he's still loved by God. He cries out to God, "God, I'm a sinner." And he's sinking of the ocean, the waves wrap around his head, his life faints away, he feels like he's entering Sheol himself. He doesn't know what to do. He doesn't even think, "You know what? The Lord is getting my attention. You know what? I think I am here because I have disobeyed the Lord. He doesn't do any of that. All he does is cry out to God from his mess, from his brokenness. He doesn't even do it right. He is completely self-centered. He uses the pronoun I 10 times in eight verses, my seven times. He's making vows that he doesn't really keep later. The point here is you don't have to work through all your junk before coming to the Lord. You don't have to have figured it all out. I was talking to a guy, invited him to church, he's like, "But I've never read the Bible." I was like, "Bro, that's like half my church. Don't worry, just come to the church." No, it's not. I mean, you guys have read the Bible. But you know what I'm saying? You don't have to be a theologian before you come. He's nasty. He hasn't cleaned himself up, gastric juice, all that, not a full repentance. But he does turn to Yahweh, and that's where the power of repentance is. What is repentance? Repentance isn't just confessing, acknowledging, chronicling all of your sins to God. He already knows them. Repentance is turning from sin and turning to the Lord. As you turn to the Lord, you're like, "Oh wow, You were gracious. You're so gracious to me." Jonah 2:1, "Jonah prayed to Lord His God from the belly of the fish." He prayed. Scripture says, "Seek me and you will find me if you seek me with all your heart." Scripture promises, "Come close to God and He will come close to you." This is how Jesus taught us to pray, "Seek and you shall find. Ask and you shall receive. Knock and it shall be opened to you." Yeah, Jonah is in a mess, but it's a self-inflicted mess, and it's a miracle that God would even take time to listen. But God does listen. Here is a God more willing to hear than we are to pray, a God who knows the words on our lips before we speak them. But He longs for us to speak them so that we may know that He has heard our prayers. To pray is to admit that there is something greater to the reality that we're all experiencing. There's a God in this reality, a God who is distinct from our own reality. He's transcendent. It's a reality which is different from ours and possibly therefore threatening. Who is this God? If I talk to this God, if I submit to this God, if I obey this God, will I be happy? Will I experience the life I want to experience? Once we come face to face with this reality, we realize, "Oh, this was the whole point the whole time. There is no joy outside of God. There is no joy outside the presence of God. There is no satisfaction apart from the presence. There's no comfort apart from the presence of God. Apart from the presence of God, all I have is darkness, Sheol for all of eternity." The Lord our God is this reality. Yahweh is the only safe hiding place, the only secure refuge. Only in Yahweh, in God can we acknowledge and expose ourself as completely defenseless, powerless, and vulnerable. He meets us there and He does not banish us. He meets us there and He loves us and He comforts us. To unmask ourselves in prayer is to begin to discover who we really are in the presence of God. In prayer, the heart, the eyes, the ears of the human soul are open to the possibility of being touched and healed by the Holy Spirit. Prayer is the breath of life, and it is Jonah's last hope, and it's our last hope. God appoints a great fish, and I take much comfort in this. In Jonah 1:17, "The Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights." When did God appoint a fish? How big of a fish does it have to be to swallow a man whole? That's a pretty big fish. I'm not an aquarist, but I assume that for a fish to get of that size, it takes time. I think God appointed this fish long before Jonah boarded a ship to Jhapa, before Jonah decided to flee from the presence of Lord to Tarshish, before even he had heard the call of God to go to Nineveh in the first place. I think God ordained this fish a long time ago knowing that this moment would come. Salvation really does belong to the Lord. And before Jonah was aware of what would happen, God had already made provision for his deliverance. Did God know that Jonah was going to sin as egregiously as he... Yes, of course. God before that sin ordains a means of deliverance. God's salvation is a sovereign gift, prepared and provided long before we even knew we needed or wanted it. Scripture teaches us that God has demonstrated His love for us in this and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Friends, there are no unexpected eventualities in your life for which grace is unprepared. There are stages or seasons in your life that I know you're scared of. You're like, "I'm not looking forward to this part." I'm like, "Grace will come." There are no unexpected eventualities in your life for which grace is unprepared. Jesus is a perfect savior to sinners, no matter the pattern or the contours of your particular sin. He is suitable to us. The Book of Hebrews says He's shaped perfectly to our need. Salvation belongs to the Lord, and He has provided it in Jesus Christ, a savior prepared in advance. Jonah 2:4. "Then I said, 'I am driven away from your sight, yet I shall again look upon Your holy temple.'" What's the connection between being banished from the presence of God and the holy temple? Jonah, what are you saying? "I've been banished because of my sin," he knows it, "but I'm still going to look at the holy temple." Why is he thinking about the holy temple? Well, the holy temple breaks down the gospel in a way that shows us both the bad news and the good news. In the holy temple, in Israel, in Jerusalem, at the center of the temple was the Holy of Holies. And at the center of the Holy of Holies was a wooden box, the Arc of the Covenant. And in it were two tablets of the Ten Commandments that Moses brought down from Mount Sinai. It's the Ten Commandments. They outline God's character, that God has called us to live a life of love toward God, love toward people. It's a law that requires what we in our heart of hearts want to be. Who doesn't want to be a loving person? Who doesn't want to be known as selfless or sacrificial or humble in the realest way? Well, that's what the commandments call us to. And the law tells us that this is the only relationship with God to keep the commandments. Well, the bad news is we've all broken the commandments. We've transgressed the commandments. If you're not even familiar with the commandments, I'll just tell you commandment number 10 is thou shall not covet your neighbor's house. All right? If you live in Boston or Brookline, you have broken that commandment. This is how we're bringing revival through the real estate market. You have all committed sin there, commitment number 10. We're all jealous, we need need grace. The good news is, over the Arc of the Covenant, over the law, there's a golden slab called the Mercy Seat. It was called the Place of Propitiation. Propitiation means to turn aside the wrath of somebody through payment. Here it's God. And once a year, on Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, an animal was killed and blood was sprinkled in the mercy seat, and God says, "I will accept the fulfillment of the law through a substitute that was killed on our behalf." Well, all of this, the temple that Jonah is thinking about, what is he thinking? He's like, "Lord, I have transgressed your law." Commandment number one, thou shall have no other gods before me. Jonah, God comes to him, he's like, "No, thanks." So he puts himself in the position of God. He supplants God from the throne. "I'm God." There you broke commandment number one, Jonah. Jonah needs propitiation and he understands unless he gets to the temple, there is no forgiveness of sins. But how can he get to the temple if he's in the belly of a fish? And this is the great conundrum. Even today, dear friends, like if you're Jewish, this is what I tell my Jewish friends, if you believe your own scriptures, if you're truly Jewish, how is there atonement for your sins? How is that being done? There are no animals being slaughtered in the temple today. There haven't been since the year 70 AD. No, no, no, this right here, the whole temple, the whole temple system, the sacrificial system, the priest system, all of that pointed to a greater temple, a greater priest, the greater sacrifice, a greater Jonah that of Jesus Christ. Jonah sojourned in the fish for three days and three nights points to Christ Himself. Matthew 12:38-41, "Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, 'Teacher, we wish to see a sign from You." But He answered them, 'An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah's three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will a Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men in Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for their repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here." Reluctant Jonah's stay in the belly of a great fish was a pointer to Jesus Christ. That's what Christ is saying. It points to Christ. And Jonah is the anti example. One of the greatest ironies, I think, in the Book of Jonah, the fish is the savior, not Jonah. The fish is the savior. But Jonah the runway prophet is the type of Christ, pointing to Christ. In what way? In the opposite. Jesus Christ came to us willingly. He lived willingly to save the lost. Really, He willingly descended all the way down to death itself to willingly welcome us into the household of God. God gives us salvation in a mysterious way. He puts Jonah in the belly of a fish and He puts His Son on a cross. It was God who hurled His Son into death, into the sea of the wrath of God. Jesus Christ on the cross, He cries out, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" What happened on the cross that the Father would forsake the Son? Well, the Son became our sin. He who knew no sin became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God. And because Jesus became our sin, He was banished from the presence of God the Father. He did in a sense descend into hell. We need to turn to Jesus Christ because He is a savior suitable to us. How can we be saved? The only thing you need to do is what Jonah did, cry out to the Lord. Do it even before you hit rock bottom. But even if you do hit rock bottom, He'll meet you there if you turn to Him with humble repentance. And for those of us who have been rescued from the storm of God's wrath, let's use our beautiful feet and mouths to preach the good news that salvation belongs to Lord Jesus Christ and is found in Him alone. Romans 10:14-17 to close, "How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent. As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news. But they have not obeyed the gospel for Isaiah says, 'Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?' So faith comes from hearing, and hearing from the word of Christ." Amen. Would you please pray with me in closing? Lord, we thank You for this word. And Lord, as we look at this sinful man, Jonah, we do not stand over him in condemnation or disdain. No, we look at him as one of us. Each one of us, we've sinned, we've run from Your commandments, we've run from Your presence, even from Your Spirit. Lord, we thank You that you've met us there, that You've given us the gift of hitting rock bottom, many of us, and You've turned us in repentance. For those who have not yet turned to You, Lord, turn them and their hearts to Yourself today and continue to make us a powerful, a missionary force here in the city and beyond. We pray this in Christ's holy name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
"I Fear God, Kind Of"

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 23, 2023 50:39


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com Heavenly Father, we thank you for the blessing it is to gather as your people to hear from your Holy Spirit, from your holy scriptures. We thank you, Lord, that you did not leave us in the darkness of our ignorance. Often we have fled from you, from your presence, from your word, from community, and we've done it intentionally, and we've done it in order to further our ignorance. Instead of leading us groping in the darkness, Lord, you send us people, messengers, ambassadors, evangelists, missionaries, Christians, believers, those who spoke the truth with love in a way that compelled our hearts. Lord, if there is anyone who is not yet a believer, a follower of Christ, a child of God today, save them. Today, override their reluctant will, and, Lord, save them from their sins. And for those of us who are your children, Lord, remind us that you have commissioned each one of us to go and make disciples, people of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Bless our time in the holy scriptures today, continue to expand your holy church, Lord. Jesus, you promised that you will build your church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it, so continue to expand your kingdom, your church, and take territory from the enemy. I pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We are beginning today a brand new sermon series through the Book of Jonah. We're really excited about it. It's four chapters, four weeks, and then we believe the Lord is leading us to do a deeper study of the life of Joseph, in Genesis 37 through 50. And then that'll take us through the end of the summer. The series title is Reluctant Believer. The title of the sermon is I Fear God, kind of, and that's who Jonah is. He's a rebel. He's not just reluctant or recalcitrant. He's often resentful of God in his ways. It's the only book about a prophet gone rogue. I had a brother approach me after the service and he said, "When I was younger, I scoffed at Jonah, and said, 'What a moron. Why would he run from God?'" And he said, "After 10 years in the faith, I can relate." And I think we all can relate. The other reason why we chose this book is because as we studied through the Book of Romans, we saw that the gospel, it's not just new news, like new news. No, the gospel was grounded in Old Testament, Hebrew scriptures. The Apostle Paul constantly quotes from the salter and the prophets to show us this was the plan from the very beginning. Romans 1:16, "For I'm not ashamed of the gospel, the good news for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek." The gospel is for everyone. This isn't new. This was the plan from the very beginning, God's family has room for everyone. This is the message at the heart of the Book of Jonah that God's compassion extends to the most wicked, even to the Gentiles, even to us. That nothing can thwart God's purpose to save sinners. And that purpose is not limited to any one group. The Gentiles, or the nations, we're always in the heart of God. He longs for people of all nations to come and to pray to him. The Jewish people were blessed with possession of the scriptures. They were told by God to bring this message that every person can be reconciled with Yahweh, to bring this light to the Gentiles. But they failed miserably as missionaries to the nations, as we'll see with Jonah, mostly because they started taking God's grace for granted. "Well, of course God loves us. We are the chosen people, of course." And we as Christians, we have to fight that tendency as well. Paul and the other apostles had to be taught, this is surprising, that God had always included the Gentiles in the number of his elect children. And that for they not all Israel, who are of Israel, Paul writes. So Jonah was the first Jewish missionary to a Gentile nation. He's called one of the 12 minor prophets. Minor, not because lesser in importance, but because of what they wrote was just shorter. Jonah was only four chapters, compared to Isaiah 66, Jeremiah 52, Ezekiel 48 chapters. The book is all about God's love. It's not about Jonah, it's about God. It's about God's pursuit of rebels. It's about God helping us overcome our pride, showing us our sin, exposing our self-righteousness and leading us to repentance by giving us the gift of grace. And then we see that God is a missionary God. God longs to save people from all nations. And ultimately, this book is all about the gospel that God's love, the Lord, Yahweh is a God of boundless compassion, not just for us, Christians, or in the story Jonah, the Israelites, but also for them, the pagan sailors, the Ninevites. And we have to keep a guard of our own hearts and the culture of our church to make sure that we continue to be welcoming to absolutely anyone and everyone. It's not us and them. It's not, "We are Christians because we're better." No, no, we're Christians because God saved us. God superimposed his will upon our will. He regenerated us. And if there's hope for us, even us, there's hope for absolutely everyone. This is the message of the Book of Jonah. So today we're in Jonah 1:1-17. Would you look at the text with me? Now, the word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of amortized saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me." But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going down to Tarshish. So he paid the fair, went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord. But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. Then the mariners were afraid, and each cried out to his god. And they hurled the cargo that was in the ship and to the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone into the inner part of the ship and had laid down and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him, "What do you mean, you sleeper. Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us that we may not perish." And they said to one another, "Come let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. They said to him, "Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country and of what people are you?" And he said to them, "I'm a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the city in the dry land." Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, "what is this that you have done!" For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord because he had told them. And they said to him, "What shall we do to you, that the sea may quiet down for us?" For the sea grew more and more tempestuous. He said to them, "Pick me up and hurl me into the sea; then the sea will quiet down for you, for I know it is because of me that this great tempest has come upon you." Nevertheless, the men rowed hard to get back to dry land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them. Therefore, they called out to the Lord, "Oh Lord, let us not perish for this man's life and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, oh Lord, have done as it pleased you." So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging. Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows. And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, and infallible, authoritative word may write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Is it a fish or a whale? Let's start with a really important questions. According to our graphic, that looks like a whale, looks like a whale in the graphic. I don't know. The Hebrew says fish, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Billy Graham said, "If you believe that in the beginning God created the world," and he's like, "even if it said Jonah ate the fish, I'd still believe it." So that doesn't matter. What matters is that God is sovereign. There are many lessons to learn from this text. Three points to frame up our time. First, the compassionate commandment of God. Second, the stiff-necked rebellion of a religious man, and the relentless pursuit by the hound of heaven. First, the compassionate commandment of God. God comes to Jonah and says verse one, now the Lord, the word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me." Well, first of all, you got to pause and say what an honor. What a great honor that God's word would come to you, and that God would so be gracious to you to give you a job, to give you a calling. A prophet being called by God to journey to Nineveh to deliver this message. This is an extraordinary phenomenon. Prophetic Oracles against nations were commonplace, but they were spoken in the prophets native land for his fellow nationals. So if we follow the pattern of the other prophets, it would be word of Lord comes to Jonah. Jonah get up in front of the Israelites, and say, "The people in Nineveh, they're terrible." And obviously, everyone in Israel is like, "Yeah, we agree." That's not the mission. Here he is given the mission and he's selected for a role to bring a word of judgment upon the people, kind of like the angels were sent as agents of divine destruction against Sodom in Genesis 19. Jonah, what do we know about him? He was a contemporary of Elijah, most likely he was one of the sons of the prophets of Elijah referring to Elijah's school. Elijah was a man and Saint john tells us that, "Elijah was a man." Elijah, one of the greatest prophets. And in the same way that Elijah was a man subject to like passions as we are, we can pause here and say, you know what? Before we start knocking Jonah, "You should have known better as a great man of God." He's still a dude. He's still a guy. The fact that these prophets were given a divine commission and divine inspiration did not make them not human. They still had a temper and they still had their own character and their own flaws, and the prophetic call was something apart from and altogether independent of their intellect or even their will. So what do we know about Jonah as the man? Well, the Hebrew name for Jonah means dove, which is nice. And if you go the allegorical route, you can infuse lots of meaning here, dove and the New Testament is a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Jonah, like the Holy Spirit brings revival to Nineveh. But what's fascinating is that Jonah is more like a hawk than a dove. He's not a dove at all. He's not happy about this mission. He's not happy about being a man of God. He's not happy about having to preach the gospel. He's not happy about people getting converted. But God can use the personality of even a stubborn person or a strong-willed person, like Jonah or Peter or Sampson or Paul. But first, God needs to break a man before he uses a man. He has to teach him, or a woman, obedience before they're used in service. The other thing I want to point out here is that God has been incredibly compassionate to Jonah. Jonah grew up in a believing family. His father was a believer, follower of the Lord, and Jonah has given the task of being a prophet, and he's given grace to live in a time where the people of God deserved judgment. 2 Kings 14:25 sets Jonah in the reign of eighth century BC King Jeroboam II. Well, Jeroboam II, he was a sinner. He did not do what God wanted him to do, and yet God, because of his grace on these people, on Jonah, he allowed the kingdom to expand. So 2 Kings 14:25 about Jeroboam II, he restored the border of Israel from Lebo-hamath as far as the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, which he had spoke by his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher. So Jonah had experienced God's grace firsthand. He saw that God can restore even a kingdom for his people, because of God's great compassion. His compassion overrides the waywardness of the people. So Jonah has been given grace, and it's expected that Jonah who has received grace is going to now share that grace with the people of Nineveh. He did not want to do that. Why? Because Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian empire, the sworn enemies of Israel. Nineveh was found in east of, today, Syria, northern part of Iraq. It's on the east side of the Tigress River. Even today, Jonah's association with that place is well known. There's a Muslim shrine there to the prophet Yunus or Jonah. And this is the last capital of the Assyrian Empire. From excavations, we know it was a grand city, had famous hanging gardens, dams, parks, a 50-mile aqueduct, great roads, a double wall protecting the city. The wall was world renowned, greater than Babylon. The wall was a 100 feet high, so broad that three wagons might be driven on it at the same time. The walls were fortified with 1500 towers at proper distances. Each rising 200 feet in height, rendering the city seemingly impregnable. No one can touch us, we're fortified. The city was also wealthy. It was the center of commerce between the East and the West. And the wickedness of Nineveh kept pace with its commercial importance and external greatness. Why Nineveh? Why Nineveh? Well, God chose Nineveh, but also we see that God often uses this same method to reach a people. This is the same way the St. Paul reached the Roman Empire. He picked city centers, urban city centers, places of influence, places where ideologies were formed and from which they were shipped. And this is where he wanted to plant the gospel. So you see the New Testament, you see all the epistles and the epistles are usually written to city centers, churches in city center, the epistles to the Romans, you got Rome, Ephesus, Thessalonica, et cetera. So in a way, this city, Nineveh, was a city set on a hill, unrivaled in splendor, but also an influence. Something that happened here would be heard about everywhere. So if the gospel, if the message of mercy, that God is a loving God, a merciful God, that our evil has come up before Him, but if we repent, He will relent of sending the wrath that we deserve. God is saying, "Jonah, go plant the gospel in the heart of your enemy's greatest city." That's what He's doing. Obviously, the parallels to what we're doing here in Boston are very clear. The reason why we came here, the reason why we're working so hard to establish this church in this city, is because Boston, pound for pound, is the most influential city in the world. Historically speaking, between the last three, four, five decades, look at the influence of this city upon the world. This is an ideology center of the world. People come here, their minds are filled with ideology, and the export the ideologies elsewhere. What is God telling us? He's saying, plant the gospel where you are. Plant the gospel in the heart of your enemy's greatest city. Plant the gospel in the heart of your enemies. This is how the Lord operates. And what's the job that Jonah is given? He says, "Call out against the city, for their evil has come up before me." None of us described as a great city, great in population, great in resources, great in the enormity of its crimes. Later on in chapter four at the end it says that there are 120,000 people that know neither left or from their right. Most likely it's talking about children. So if you say that children are one fifth of a population, you're talking about maybe 600,000 people in population, maybe upwards of a million. Incredibly, incredibly powerful, but also sinful. People who are committing acts of evil against God, heaven daring iniquities. And we're reminded from the very beginning that that God is holy. And before Jonah brings a message of forgiveness, which he didn't want to bring, he does bring a message of judgment. That evil, our evil, the Ninevites personal evil, their evil has come up before the Lord. We're reminded that God is holy. There are things that you and I get used to, but God as our holy creator never will never get used to, He's revolted by. Idolatry and lying and cheating and stealing and hatred, adultery, murder things we get accustomed to. Things we write off as weakness, God deems wickedness. He does use the word evil. So point number one, well, I said that God is given a message of compassion to Jonah. Well, where's the compassion in going to a people and calling out their evils? Where's the compassion there? Well, friend, that's the most compassionate thing you can do. The absolute most... If we believe that God is truly holy, and if we believe that one transgression against his commandment is enough to render us guilty for eternity, and unless we repent of our sin and turn to Christ, we will spend eternity in hell, and internal damnation. If you really believe that, the absolute most compassionate thing that I can do is to tell you the truth that God can do. This is the most compassionate thing. That there is evil that you have committed that has come up before the Lord. We need to know this and we need to respond to this mission. Realize the gravitas of the situation that we stand condemned before a holy God. So what does God do in his love? He sends a messenger who will bring this message. And this is a good reminder that our salvation does not begin with ourselves. How did you come to faith? And by the way, this is a great practice in your community group. Maybe this week share a little bit, maybe one to two people about how you came to faith. And specifically about whom did God send into your life to nudge you over? Whom did God send to nudge you over? He sends a lot of people to prepare us, and I was kind of like this. I grew up in a Christian family. I went to Christian camp. My dad would be like, "Yeah, believe in Jesus." And I was like, "Yeah, but you're my dad." And then one time I went to this, randomly, this conference, I heard this guy speak. He was a Slavic immigrant that grew up here, was educated here, spoke Russian fluently, spoke English fluently. What's dead serious about God, did not take himself seriously at all. So he cracked jokes, and I was nine and I liked that. And he just explained the gospel. He was like, "Yeah, you're a sinner, you're going to hell." I was like, "Yeah, that's true." And he's like, "Just trust in Jesus." And I was like, "That's all he takes." He's like, "Yeah." And I was like, "All right," so I repented my sins. I trusted in Jesus. He didn't say anything that was new or novel or different, but for some reason the Holy Spirit took his words and just nudged me over the edge. So God, this is how He operates. Did God bring someone to preach the gospel to you, to explain the gospel to you? Praise God for those people, but also understand that it wasn't them. Before they came and they spoke this message to you, God moved their hearts. God filled their hearts with compassion, and God moved their will to speak to you. So friends, also a reminder that you perhaps are that person for someone. You are that person for someone. There are people in your life perhaps that are ready. You just need to nudge them over the edge. Continue speaking the truth. Continue speaking it in love. Point number two is a stiff-necked rebellion of a religious person. Tarshish got all my S's messed up. Jonah 1:3, but Jonah rose to fleet to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa, found a ship going to Tarshish. So he paid the fair and went down into it, to go with them at Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord. What's fascinating, first of all, whenever God tells you something or tells someone something, if the next word is, "But Jonah," the story isn't going well. This is only verse number three. Come on, we're just getting started, so that's... The other thing, I call the guy stiff-necked because Tarshish is literally the opposite direction of Nineveh. He literally went to the ship station and he is like, "Where is diametrically opposed to this place? I want to go there." And that's why I call him stiff-necked. Stiff-necked is you know exactly what God's will is, but you're doing the opposite. I use that phrase because in the Old Testament, that's how God describes the people of Israel, stiff-necked. Over Christmas break, I went shark hunting. It's just a cool way of saying I went fishing for sharks, but I went shark hunting and I caught a bunch of sharks. They were epic. They were massive. They were so big, they almost ate me. No, they were tiny. They were so small. And so you reel it up, and then like you got to grab this thing by the neck to take the hook out. My goodness, I've never felt a more powerful neck on a tiny little creature, and I've got children, so that's why that's a big deal. He's stiff, "No, I'm not going. I'm going the opposite direction." Literally, he goes, trying to get away from God away from the presence of the Lord. You see this phrase over and over, away from the presence of the Lord. It sounds ludicrous. You can't get away from the presence of the Lord. So what is happening in your mind, Jonah? Well, first of all, you've got to ask and say, who's running? Well, this is a prophet. This is a religious man. This is a man of God, but for some reason, something happened where there is just a major gap between his relationship with God and his religion. In some ways, his religion became more important than his relationship with God and his word. It was his religion that prevented him from obeying God, because his religion taught him, he thought, and that was actually a man-made interpretation. No, no, no, no, no, love your enemy? No, no, no, you got to hate your enemy. Hate your enemy. Despise your enemy. That's your sworn enemy. That's who the Assyrians were. That's who Ninevites were. If your religion friend prevents you from loving your enemy, then you are not a child of God, because God loved us when we were yet enemies. God loves His enemies. He loved His enemies so much that he gave his son up for us. Lesson, you can be religious and sitting at the same time, and Jonah was running away from the revelation of God. He believed that God only spoke to his prophets in Israel. He thought, "If I get out of Israel, I get out of the confines of God's presence." But what we see here more than anything else is that Jonah gives us a definition of sin. Sin isn't just transgressing a commandment, it's transgressing the will of God. There are sins of co-mission, when we break a commandment we have committed a sin. But there are also sins of omission, where if you know the good that you ought to do, the good that God has called you to do, and you do not do it, you've disobeyed God in the same way as if someone transgressed the law. So what is sin? It's disobeying the will of God. And if that's the definition of sin, my goodness, everyone's guilty, and that's the point from the very beginning. The wicked Ninevites are as guilty as Jonah, the prophet. The pagan sailors, who at the end of this chapter bring sacrifice to the Lord, they are in trepidation, trembling, fear of God. They're making vows worshiping God, because they understood that they also were sinners. A definitive word comes from God. When Jonah chooses to disobey, he chooses to base his understanding of reality on religion, on nationalism, ethnicity, tradition, et cetera. So he runs from God. He isn't running from the spacial presence of God as much as he's running from the relational presence of God. Do you know that feeling, when you know you're in sin? We know it. It's like the Bible becomes kryptonite. It's just like a magnet, it's pushed away from you, the Bible is. Christians, no, all of their phone numbers blocked. Blocked, you're not reaching. First thing you do, you drop out of community or drop out of church, you drop out of... What are you doing? You know that when you're with the people of God, you feel the presence of God. You know when you're a holy scripture, you feel the presence of God. So when you know when you're in sin, you're stiff-necked and you're like, "I want to get away from the presence of God," because at that moment, the presence of God is not comfortable. The presence of God is convicting. It's a fool's errand to run from the spirit of God. He's everywhere. Psalm 139:7-12, where shall I go from your spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol,, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, "Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night," even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you. It was not that God was not everywhere present, but that there were consecrated places that represented the presence of God, and he wanted to get away. Obviously, it was silly, but we've all been in situations like this. Where you know the Lord has brought you in a situation, perhaps a relationship, and he's like, "So you got to stay here," or in a church community, sins been exposed, "stay here, work through it." Sometimes we run like Jonah. Perhaps God has a particular call on your life. Are you fleeing it? Tarshish was a city on the coast of Spain. So they're headed there. And we see in the language, it just describes this dissension that's happening with Jonah. He arose to flee. He goes down to Joppa. He found a ship, pays the fair, went down into it, down, down, down. Trying to flee from the presence of Lord always brings you down. Why did Jonah run? Well, he tells us in chapter four, the thought is he's afraid. Assyrians, they're going to kill him. That's what he's afraid of. Well, I don't think that's the theory because for a number of reasons. First of all, the guy's suicidal. Four times he's like, "Just kill me. Just kill me. I don't want to do anything. I don't want to be here. Lord, just kill me." And God's like, "Nope. Nope. Nope." He also does tell us, he's like, "Lord, I knew what would happen if I preached to the Ninevites." This is Jonah 4:1-4, but it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. He preaches to the gospel one time. He goes through a stroll. He is like, "You're all going to die. You're all going to die." That's like the dream sermon, man. I would love to do that. Just walk the streets to Boston, "Everyone's going to die!" But the thing is, I got to keep living here. Jonah gets to leave. So he preached the gospel. Everyone gets saved, and he's bummed about it. He's so mad. But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. And he prayed to the Lord and said, "Oh, Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding and steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore, now, oh, Lord, please take my life from me, for it's better for me to die than to live." And the Lord said, "Do you do well to do anger?" He was afraid not that the Ninevites would not repent, no, he was afraid that they would repent. That's how much he hated them. He's like, "God, I would rather die than spend eternity with these losers." That's the sentiment in his heart. So God sends Jonah to preach to the Gentiles, even though Jonah despises them. This would be like Yahweh sending a patriotic South Korean evangelist into North Korea to preach to Kim Jong Un, same situation. And so Jonah is representative of his people, as the elder brother in Luke 15 is representative of the Pharisees. It's like Jesus spending time with tax collectors and sinners. Similar to the parable of the unforgiving servant who's forgiven a huge sum only to deny forgiveness to a colleague over trifling debt. Jonah too is a sinner saved by divine grace who wants to do everything possible to not allow pagan sinners to be the same recipients of the same grace. We're all like Jonah in many ways desiring justice for others, but grace for ourselves. "Yeah, I don't deserve it, but that person deserves it even less than I do." This is the sinful, self-righteousness in Jonah. So what happens? Well, point three, the relentless pursuit by the hound of heaven. And I get this phrase from CS Lewis who talks about God like that. He said the night of his conversion, he was in his dorm room on his knees. He felt the presence of God really heavy in the room, didn't want to repent. He's like, "I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it." And then finally submits to the Lord. And he said, "That night I was the most reluctant and despondent convert in all of England." Like, "Yeah, I'll believe in you, but I'm not happy about it." That's the same situation with Jonah. Verse four, but the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so the ship threatened to break up. Who sends the storm? God sends a storm. God sends a storm because Jonah needed a storm. And God at times uses pain to get our attention. It's a means of grace. In storms, the real you comes out. Storms reveal who you are and your need for God. That we are contingent, we are dependent. As Lewis writes, "Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasure, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world." This is the function of pain on the lowest level. It's to shattered the illusion that all is okay and to plant the flag of truth within the fortress of a rebel's soul. On a higher level, pain shatters another illusion that we are self-sufficient. We are not. Verse five says, the mariners were afraid, and each cried out to his god. And they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the seat to lighten it for them. And Jonah had gone into the inner part of the ship and had laid down and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him, "What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish." So you see the sailors using emergency measures, jettisoning cargo. This is the last grasp at life. And the captain comes in and says, "What do you mean? What do you mean?" I like the King James version, "What meanest thou?" Where it was like, he just doesn't have any. Like, "What are you doing? We're all in the brink of death and you're sleeping here." And Jonah's like, "Yes, that's the point. I'm trying to die." And in storms, we see that people do get religious. All the sailors, they're pagans, and they're like, "We're praying to our god. Do you have a god? Our gods aren't working. Do you have one? Try your god out." And of all the men in the ship, Jonah was the person that should have been awake more than anyone else. Nevertheless, he was asleep, fast asleep. The creaking of the cordage, the dashing of the waves, the howling of the winds, the straining of the timbers, the shouting of the sailors nothing can arouse this guy. He's fastened in the arms of sleep. The Hebrew word here is radam, which means the deepest sleep. The word is used to describe the sleep that God puts on Adam when he takes the rib from him, like anesthesia, deep sleep. Many a preacher commentator said that, "Jonah hears asleep because his conscience is asleep." The great pastor Charles Spurgeon has a great sermon on this. If your conscience is asleep, you should read that sermon. But I don't think that's what's going on here. I don't think he's asleep because of a seared conscience. Later on, because I see that he's very quick to repent. No, I think there's something else going on here. I think this is an anguish of the soul. The Holy Spirit has been convicting him and he's been trying to fall asleep. Just before his crucifixion, Jesus prayed in Gethsemane. And as he prayed, he sweat great drops of blood, and then Jesus found his disciples asleep. Why were they asleep? Luke 22:45 tells us, and when he rose up from prayer and had come to his disciples, he found them sleeping from sorrow. Sometimes the response to grief is sleep. I will tell you that rebelling against God is exhausting, and it's exhausting at the soul level. Jonah's retreating from God, from the presence of God. Perhaps God had removed His gracious presence and replaced it with His disciplinary presence. We're not sure. A Jonah 1:7 says, they said to one another, "Come let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. When the trial by lot was resorted to figure out what was going on. I think at that moment the lot falls on Jonah, Jonah felt the arrest of God's hand upon him. It said, "Jonah, you're exposed, sovereignly exposed, what do you do now?" Verse eight, then they said to him, "Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?" And he said to them, "I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea in the dry land." Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, "What is this that you have done!" For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them. Jonah, maybe he doesn't understand, maybe it's cognitive dissonance or something, but even the sailors get it. "You just said you fear the Lord and then you told us that you're running from the presence of God. We're all about to die and you keep telling us that you're a great follower of the Lord." No, no. They're rebuking him. The pagan sailors are rebuking a man of God. God rebukes him, the storm rebuked him, and the pagan sailors rebuked him, because this is not fear of God. Fear of God is to hate evil. Well, it's evil to disobey God. So no, you do not fear God in the moment that you disobey him. You fear something greater. You can't but admire the frankness of Jonas confession of guilt, and he's willing to surrender to the claims of justice as we're about to see, when he could have denied the whole thing. At this moment, the captain comes to him and says, "Wake up owe you sleeper, what meanest thou?" And Jonah wakes up and says, "I meanest nothing. Leave me alone. I'm ready to die." "Is this your fault?" "Nope, not my fault. Not my fault." "Who do you believe?" "Don't worry about it. I'm going back to sleep." He doesn't do any of that, so that's why I don't take the interpret interpretation that he was asleep because of seared conscience, because as soon as providence forces him to deal with this issue, we hear of no shuffling excuses, no dishonest evasions, no blame shifting, but only the unreserved utterance of a heart already conscious of guilt. He's ready to take on the judgment that he knows he deserves. Verse 11, then they said to him, "What shall we do to you, that the sea might may quiet down for us?" For the sea grew more and more tempestuous. He said to them, "Pick me up and hurl me into the sea; then the sea will quiet down for you, for I know it is because of me that this great temp has come upon you." Nevertheless, the men rowed hard to get back to dry land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them. These men are over overawed by the manifestation of divine justice that they're seeing right in front of their eyes. Some preachers would get up and like, "Hey, you should believe in Jesus. Here's my testimony. Everything was terrible. I believe in Jesus, and everything was awesome." Jonas, the anti-testimony, he gets up and he is like, "Look, if you disobey God, this is what's going to happen to you." So they're absolutely freaking out and they think that they see God's vengeance upon this person, and they're like, "This same God sent the storm," so they are absolutely humbled by God. They're doing everything possible to protect themselves from God's judgment. That's why they're rowing so hard. And finally, verse 14, they called out to Lord, "Oh, Lord..." Oh, Lord, that sounds like believers. They believer. "Oh, Lord, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, oh, Lord, have done as it pleased you." Oh yeah, they believe in the sovereignty of God. So they picked up, Jonah hurled him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging. And then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows. And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Jonah feared God, kind of, because of his example. We see these men that fear God and they fear him exceedingly. The fish, this was miraculous, but it just shows the sovereignty of God. Here, I want you to meditate with me real quick on both severity and the mercy of God toward Jonah. Did you notice it's not enough for Jonah that he confessed his transgression and condemned himself on account of it? Why doesn't the storm stop at that moment? Jonah gets on his knees and says, "Yahweh, I repent of my sin. I'm so sorry. Forgive me." The storm should have ended. That should have been the end. He should be like... they all get saved. And then he's like, "Church isn't a cruise ship, it's a battleship. Let's go, gentlemen. We're go to Nineveh." Rallies up the troops and goes take Nineveh. That's not what happens at all. There wasn't enough. Why doesn't God stop the storm immediately after the confession? Why? Because justice demands more. Why such painful severity here? Because the ends of the divine government required it. First, in the instance of Jo Jonah himself, he had sinned presumptuous against God. He must bear the penalty. It was a righteous thing for God to do and inflict such judgment. Hebrews 12, dear Christian, a lot of Christians live and they operate with theology that's completely removed to Hebrews 12. And in Christ, there's no condemnation for my sins, but if I sin against God and I do it willfully, like Jonah does, Hebrews 12 kicks in friends. Hebrews 12, go back and read Hebrews 12:5-12. It says, if God loves a son or daughter, and the son or daughter are walking wayward, disobeying, what does... God does discipline those whom he loves. Still more was, which this is an example of severity needed for the good of others. The honor and the cause of God were at this time particularly bound up with the faithfulness of Jonah and having failed in the way of duty to promote the glory of God, he must in another way, become an instrument in advancing the glory of God. He should have glorified God by preaching to the Ninevites. And God would've blessed them and God would've been glorified. Instead, God will be glorified through this man, even though the man doesn't want to be glorified as an anti example, don't be like this guy. Thus, we learn from his experience that a near relationship to God purchases no immunity from sin or from discipline, and that's Hebrews 12:5-11. 2 Timothy 2-20-22 talks about this. Do you want to be a vessel of honorable use in the house of God or dishonorable use? I would recommend you read that. What befell Jonah was severity, but also the mercy of God. No sooner is he cast out, as a victim of divine justice into the raging deep, a great fish was ready to swallow him. Not for instant destruction, but for safe preservation. Jonah is spared final death with a temporary death. People wonder how in the world did he live 72 hours in the belly of a fish simmering in gastric juices? I just like saying that phrase. That's a juicy phrase. You can practice it, gastric juices. I think he died. I don't know. I would've died. I don't know. Whatever happened, he was entombed. Did God keep him alive? Did God resuscitate him? Did God resurrect him? That doesn't matter. What doesn't matter is he's taken to darkness to finally be brought to light, and God often does that. 2 Corinthians 4:6, for God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Fast-forward about 750 years from the storm, from Jonah's entombment in the belly of the fish, comes Jesus Christ, the greater Jonah. Jesus began his messianic mission by preaching the gospel to crowds in the Galilee region, which was at the heart of the northern kingdom one time, before being captured by Syria. As the crowds grew, Jesus' popularity grows. His opposition from the religious leaders, Pharisees, also grew. So Jesus is doing miracles, and yet they won't submit to him. They finally come to him and they say, "Give us proof that you are the Messiah." Matthew 12:38-42. Mind you, this is after Jesus had healed a man with a withered hand, healed two blind men, restored the life of a young girl along with countless other miracles. Matthew 12:38-42, then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him saying, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you." But he answered them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here." Knowing that they were trying to trick him, Jesus says, "The only sign that you're going to get is the gospel, the sign of the prophet Jonah. What is it? It's death, it's burial and it's resurrection." And Jesus says, "What happened with Jonah was just a sign pointing to Jesus Christ." Jesus speaks of this forthcoming sign, His death, His resurrection as the sign of Jonah, those Ninevites who believe Jonah's preaching will be called by Yahweh as witnesses on judgment. They will testify that they believe in Jonah's preaching on far less evidence than Jesus has given the scribes and the Pharisees, because it's never a question of evidence. It's never a question of evidence. It's always a question of will. If the gospel of Jesus Christ, if you seeing what God did there and the gospel of Jesus Christ, where God should have just killed all of us, a storm on all of us, we're all just dead, spend eternity in hell. No, no, no. Jesus Christ, willingly, Himself, God comes incarnate, lives a perfect life, perfectly, in this broken world, surrounded by evil people, surrounded by sinful people. This same God goes to the cross to die for our sins. What is Jesus doing there? He's bearing the wrath of God that we deserve for our evil. The same condemnation that the Ninevites deserve, that Jonah deserves, and that the sailors deserve, we deserve. And Jesus goes, and on the crust, he's bearing the wrath of God for our sins. He's taken the storm of the wrath of God, the raging of the wrath of God that we deserve for choosing our own will. For every single moment in life, when we said, "No, no, no, God, not your will, my will be done." For every single one of those moments, Jesus Christ comes and he says, "No, no, no. For that moment, I paid. I paid by saying, "Not my will, Father, but yours be done." Jesus Christ, the perfect servant of God, submits himself not just as a testimony to us and an example to us. That's all good and well, but he does that to save us from our sins. He wasn't forced to do it, he did it willingly. Out of love for us here. Here just a message for believers and unbelievers alike. I've met many of people who like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll come to God on my time. All right, I'll, I'm going to go to Tarshish for a bit. I'm going to take a ship. I'm going to get on a boat, and I'll come back. I'll do my job." Let me just tell you something. After studying Romans and studying Jonah, do I believe in free will? The closest we get to free will in the book of Jonah is the fish, Free Willy. There is no free will. There's zero free will in this book. Jonah does not want to preach. "Jonah, you're going to preach." "I'm not going to." "You're going to preach." "God, I want to die." "You're not going to die yet. You're not going to die. You're not going to die." "God, I don't want them to get saved." "They're going to get saved." This guy is stubborn and he was forced by God into submission to bow. His lips were compelled to utter words, which of himself he would've never done. It was all the Lord's doing. God will accomplish His will in your life. The only question is, will you come willingly and joyfully? Which you should, come on. Or reluctantly and begrudgingly? Christ's death and resurrection is the foundation for the gospel, which is to be preached to the ends of the earth and is the sign of Jonah, which lives on. And the commission that God gave each one of us go and make disciples of all nations. So friend, if you are not yet a Christian, a child of God, if you're not sure, just know your evil has come up before the Lord, and if your evil is not dealt with on the cross of Jesus Christ, it will be dealt on you for eternity. So we plead with you, receive God's grace, repent, and believe in Jesus Christ. And for those of you who are Christians, let us not forget our marching orders. We are to follow Christ in making disciples. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly, Father, we thank you for this wonderful text. We thank you for this wonderful book. We pray that you continue to make us a people full of your compassion, the same compassion you feel for others. Let us feel it as well. In particular, in sharing the gospel, helping people meet you and be ushered in to the kingdom of God. We pray all this in Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Praying for Hope

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 16, 2023 53:01


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Good morning. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Tyler. I am the teens or youth and hospitality director here at Mosaic Boston. And whenever I get the chance to be up here, it is truly my honor and privilege to be able to deliver God's word to all of us today. So this week we're kind of in between series, and so the pastors gave me the opportunity to preach something that is on my heart and it's a message about hope. I'm calling it, Praying for Hope. We're going to be spending most of our time in the text in Ephesians. And my wife and I recently had just gone through Ephesians, and so this is something I've been thinking about, been meditating on. But even before then, this idea that we're going to see and expound upon in this text is something that God has been working in my own heart, challenging me, growing me in, and I think it's something that will benefit the church as a whole. So we're going to see what does God mean? What does God call us to pray for? But what does it mean to pray for hope in our lives and in the church in general? So before we get started, will you pray with me over the preaching of God's word? Heavenly Father, Lord, you are good. We are so thankful that we get to be here today to hear your word, to learn from you, to know you more. So Lord, we ask that in this time that you speak to us through your word, that you use me to proclaim the truth of your word for all of us. And you challenge us, you soften our hearts to see the reality of who you are and how you are working in our lives. So Lord, we thank you. We praise you. In Jesus' name. Amen. Alrighty, we will be in Ephesians 1:15-23. So if you have your Bibles, you can turn there. If not, you could follow along on the screens behind me, but I'll read the whole thing and then we'll get started. So Ephesians 1:15 says this, "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you, what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of His power towards us who believe, according to the working of His great might, that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named not only in this age, but also in the one to come. And He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all." This is the reading of God's holy, inherent, authoritative, infallible word. May He write these eternal truths upon our hearts. We're going to be spending our time in kind of three points today. The three points are actually one sentence and the third point of that sentence has three subpoints. So just to throw some chaos and difficulty into things. But the one sentence that I want you guys to take away from this is the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God. And the reason why the church should do that is to have hope, to recognize riches, and to perceive power. So that's what we're going to be spending our time in today. And so if you're like, "Wow, Tyler normally goes a long time with three points, and now He has three and three subpoints," I want to encourage you points one and two are on one page. So we'll get through those real quick. We'll spend most of the time on point number three. But point number one, the church, this is verse 15. Verse 15 says, "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints..." Who is Paul addressing here? He is addressing the church. Well, he's clarifying how he knows it's the church that he's speaking to. It's the people that have faith in the Lord Jesus and love for all the saints. This is the very basics, the very fundamental definition of the church. It's those, it's the people who have faith in the Lord Jesus and love towards all the saints. Now, a couple clarifying things. I love that it says, Lord Jesus, because I think oftentimes in my mind I focus on savior Jesus, which is good. Jesus is savior. I have faith in Jesus as my savior. Which is what we talked about last week with Easter, and we talk about every week at Mosaic, that Jesus came and died to save us from our sins and raised to life three days later to prove that He had the power to do it, to save us from our sins. We have faith in that. But He's not just savior, He's also Lord. Lord is ruler. He is Lord. He has power. He has authority over our lives today and we trust in Him as our king. We have faith in Him as our Lord and Savior. That's a Christian. And naturally, when you do that, you love the saints. So let's clarify saints. If you're like me, I grew up in a Catholic Church, and so a saint is someone who did some really incredible work and then died, and so you get to be a saint. But that's not what the word means. The word just means holy or set apart. Paul is talking about Christians. He's talking about the church. And so when we have faith in Jesus, naturally, we should love each other, we should care for each other. And so Paul is just being very clear at the start, he is addressing the church. He is talking to the church. And so everything that we're going to talk about now, he is addressing to Christians. And so if you're here today, and you're not a Christian and you're like, "Well, why am I here?" Praise God that you're here. We're very thankful that you're here. We want you to be able to see a glimpse into what we talk about when we talk about church. We're not talking about a meeting on Sundays. We're not talking about a place that we go to do the thing we're supposed to do and get on. We're talking about a faith and love of Jesus Christ and a love for each other. And what I would just ask you, humbly, in this time, if you are able to just pray and ask God, "If this is true, if you are real, if you are here, open my eyes to see you." Ask God that, "If this is true and what we are speaking about is true," ask Him to reveal himself to you. Because what we are going to see in this text is that God works powerfully in His church to help, to give hope, and to save His people. Forgot to mention real quick, we have a motto, love Jesus simple, right? That's what this text is all about. That's why we have that motto, love Jesus simple. We love God, we love His people, and we love those who do not yet recognize that they're His people. We love the church. We have love for the saints. We love God and Jesus. Specifically Jesus, not just God in general, but we love Jesus Himself. So we have faith in Jesus. We love the saints. Simple, that's all we need. That's the foundation. That's the point. That's the root of all of that. We do. End of point one, nice job, nice and easy. Point number two, the church should pray. And this is verses 16 and the beginning of 17. It says this, "I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory..." And we're going to pause there and leave you on a little bit of a cliffhanger. But Paul starts saying, "I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers..." First thing, we cannot separate thanksgiving and prayer. When we pray, thanksgiving needs to be a part of it. Whatever you are thankful for in this life, whenever something happens or you receive something or whatever, you're just reminded of something that you're thankful for, praise God for that thing. Literally, go to Him in prayer and praise Him. Thank Him for it. We cannot separate thanksgiving and prayer. But specifically what Paul is thankful for is for the church, is for other believers, brothers and sisters in Christ. Christians, we are called to be thankful for each other, so thank you. I mean that very sincerely. You don't know how much this church has been an encouragement to me, been an encouragement to the staff, been an encouragement to the pastors, to each other, been able to support and help each other throughout the many years that this church has been here. Thank you. I praise God and thank Him for you and your faithfulness to Him. And I mean that sincerely. Now, when we look at each other, do we sincerely feel that way? Let's feel that way. Let's be thankful for each other that God has blessed us with the ability to have these relationships with each other. The next thing I want to point out is that Paul is very specific in who he is praying to and why he is praying to Him. This is the beginning of verse 17, "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory...." So he's specific. Paul's not just talking to air. He's not just throwing out prayers to someone in general. He is praying to the God of our Lord Jesus Christ. He's specific. And then he throws it in and follows up with the Father of glory. Is this just some fancy phrasing that really religious people like to do so they sound nice when they pray in the letters read out loud to the church? No. What Paul is doing here is he's clarifying why He's praying and trusts this God that he's praying to. He's not just any God. He's not just any person. He's the Father of glory. I was reading a commentary on this text and it was written by a guy named Francis Foulkes, who he didn't write many commentaries, but he did on Ephesians. But most of his works were about prayer. Most of the things he wrote was like how to pray. Why do we pray? What does it look like to pray? Things like that. And I thought that he would be a very helpful person to study in these texts. And this is what he says about Paul's address of God. He says, "He is the Father to whom all glory belongs; for all the power and majesty revealed in creation, providence and redemption are His, and He the source. Such a thought of who God is gives to prayer a sense of awe and strengthens the faith in those who pray." Christians, we should strengthen our faith when we pray. It actually matters how we address God when we pray. It doesn't mean that we have to say, "The Father of glory," that's not the point. For me personally, when I prayed, I said, "Heavenly Father," that's what I usually say. You don't have to say that either. But I say that, because I'm reminding myself, yeah, I'm praying to God who is in heaven. He is above all things. He rules. He reigns. That's who He is. But He's not just in heaven. He's a father. He's relational. He knows us. He cares for us. We can have relationship with Him. And so I start, when I pray that way because I'm reminding myself, I'm speaking to the God who has a relationship with me, and He has power to do things. He has power to hear me. I trust He will hear me. I trust that He can act on what I'm asking of Him. I trust and grow in my awe and faith of Him. And so this isn't to say that's how we all need to pray, but what we all need to do is go to God in awe and reverence. Go to Him and prepare our hearts when we pray to say, yeah, I am speaking to the one true all powerful God. That matters. That makes a difference. And so when we are in times of questioning, times of doubt, times of weakness still go to God in strength, not our own strength, but we can go to Him saying, "God, I know I'm weak, but you're strong. God, I'm weak, but I'm reminding myself of who you are. I'm reminding myself of how you've been faithful to me." And so that regardless of our season in life, we can pray in strength, because it's God's strength, not our own that we pray in. And then from this point on in our text, Paul is going to launch into specifics that he prays over the church. So he's writing this letter to remind them and encourage them. He is praying for them and he's going to tell them specifically what He's praying about. And as we continue through these texts, we're going to see what are those specific things, and we're going to stop and we're going to pray for those things for this church. Why? Because Paul thought it was important to pray over the church in Ephesus. And if God thought it was important enough to canonize in scripture, I think it's something good that we should pray for ourselves as well. Plus, I know that it is something good for us to pray for ourselves as well. But real quick before we continue with that, I want to point something out, and this is something that I learned only a couple years ago and was never explicitly taught to me. And I was like, "Wow, why was this never explicitly taught? This is really important." When anyone, myself or a pastor or someone else is up here preaching and praying, or if you're in a small group and one person is praying and you're just there listening, we're all praying. And what I mean by that is it's not a time to just sit and listen and think, "Okay, do I like what he's saying?" Or, "That sounds good or nice? I like that wording." That's not the point. But it's the time of Christians to be led by one person to pray to God together about the same things. That's why the word amen matters. If you don't know the word, amen means truly. You're saying that you agree with everything that was said and you're praying it. So we've all done this, I'm guilty of this as well, but if you've ever been in a prayer group and someone's praying and it's late and you're tired and your mind starts drifting and you don't really hear anything that they're saying, and then the end comes and everyone's like, "Amen," you're like, "Amen. Amen." You just lied and you're guilty of lying. So what I'm saying is that as we talk about these things, I'm asking that we as a church pray together for God to bless His church with these things. It's not about me standing up here praying these things. It's about us as the body of Christ praying together in unity and seeking God for His help. So with that, that's the end of point two, on to point three. Wow, we're flying through this. Point three, the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God. This is verses 17 through the end. I'm just going to read the first part of it for us. But "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened." We'll stop there for now. So Paul's first request to God in prayer for the church is for us, for that church, but applicable to us as well, to have a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. Everything else that we're going to talk about, all of the rest of the requests of Paul are summarized in this point. He gets more specific as to why it matters as he goes along, but this is the heart of it. What Paul really wants for the church is to have a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the knowledge of God. So what does that mean? What is the spirit of wisdom in the knowledge of God? Well, wisdom is knowledge applied, right? Wisdom is about how we act based on information that we have. So you can classify it as a spirit to know God's will. The ability to know what God wants for us, for His people, for His church, for us to do. And then what is the spirit of a revelation in the knowledge of him? This is a spirit to know God, to see God. Well, Paul, you're writing to Christians, don't they already know God? Why are you asking for a spirit of revelation in the knowledge of him? Because we all can know God deeper, better, and more personal. Again, Francis Foulkes in His commentary on this section says this, "Such wisdom and revelation, moreover, come, not simply as such higher intelligence is given from God, but by the knowledge of Him, the personal knowledge of God Himself, which in the Bible always connotes the experience of life in union and fellowship with Him. Paul put the prayer for wisdom first, because to him the gospel was so wonderful that it was impossible for people to see the glory of it unless they were taught by God, and also because he knew that the knowledge of God was life itself." So when put that way, does it make sense to pray for a spirit, to pray for more revelation of God so that we can have greater unity with Him in this life, that we can have greater fellowship with Him in life? Yes, of course, it does. Well, how does that happen? How do we receive the spirit of wisdom and the spirit of revelation and the knowledge of him? It's the next verse that says, "having the eyes of your hearts enlightened that you may know," right? It's not that God is suddenly going to be someone more of Himself than He was so you could recognize it. He's always there. He's always there. We need to recognize Him there. We need to see how He is working. See who He is. We need to have the eyes of our hearts enlightened. What does that phrase mean, eyes of our hearts? Our hearts don't have eyes, that just doesn't make sense. Well, the only way you think of your heart is as a beating organ, you're probably the first person in all of history. Because every single culture talks about the heart, not just as a beating organ, but also as more than that, as part of who you are about emotions and desires. But what Paul is saying with the eyes of your heart, it's saying, "Let all of who you are, the truest part of you, your soul, everything that you are, have that open, your eyes open to see who God is, to see who He is, and how He is working His will and His revelation in your life." And we need to have our eyes opened, because we can't do it ourselves, right? We all know this experientially that we can see things and not actually understand what they are, or we can hear things and not understand what you're supposed to take away from it. During first service, it came to me that there's a really good example of this in art for me. I can look at art, I could see there's painting and brushes and whatever, and I just don't get it. It's art. Cool, that's nice. But I understand that there is beauty in it and that some people do get it. And so I need to have the eyes of my heart enlightened. There's a painting or a picture in our office space that Raquel, God bless, who God has used powerfully in this church and has blessed her, but Raquel loves this painting and I look at it, I'm like, "I don't get it." It makes me angry that I don't... Anyway, but she gets it. So I just need to have the eyes of my heart enlightened to the truth of the beauty of that painting. But anyway, I bring that up to say we all know what it means to see something and not get it. And what Paul is praying for the church is that we're not that way with God, that we can see Him and we can get Him, and we can see the fullness of Him and grow in our relationship with Him. And we need God to do that for us. We see this idea also in Isaiah 6:9-10, it says, "'Keep on hearing but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed." It's a very difficult text, but what it's saying is that God is the one who has the power to open people's eyes. And so if we need our eyes open to the reality of God, let's go to Him. Let's ask him. Let's ask Him to reveal Himself to us. And if you're here today and you're not a Christian, this is what I urge you, ask God, open your eyes. Ask God to reveal himself to you, to show you to reveal His love, His grace, His mercy, and His power through the work of Christ for you. And he ends this part by saying, "that you may know..." And then he continues with what He's praying for. We need the eyes of our hearts opened and enlightened, not so that we could have an idea about what God is like, so that we can know Him, that we can know the hope that He gives us, that we can know what the inheritance is, that we can have confidence in Him. It's not a wishy-washy thing, but we could have confidence in Him. That's what God wants for us, and we need Him to open our eyes to it. So as the first thing that Paul is praying for the church, let's now spend some time praying for us, this body, this church here to receive wisdom, a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of God. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we need you. We need more of you, and we need to see you. Open the eyes of our hearts to wherever we are blind to you and who you are and the way you are working in our lives. Give us eyes to see you. Lord, wherever we are blind, wherever we are stubborn, where wherever we are hardhearted, soften us and open our eyes to know you more. Grow our relationship with you. Lord, we know you desire the deepest relationship with us. Give us hearts that desire the deepest relationship with you to know you personally, to love you personally. Bless this body of believers, your church here with the deepest growth in relationship and love for you. Thank you. In Jesus' name, amen. So now He's going to get into three subpoints for why we should have a spirit of wisdom and revelation of God. So the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God, subpoint number one, to have hope. To have hope. And each of the subpoints is going to get a little bit more specific, but they're all relating back to this idea of hope. And they're going to be ways that Paul shows that we as the body, we as Christians, can have hope. So this is in verse 18 where it says, "having the eyes of your hearts enlightened that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you..." Have you ever thought about hope that way, as you're calling? Christians, you are called to have hope. We are not called to despair. We are not called to anxiety. We are called to hope. And not just any kind of hope, a living hope. Pastor Shane referenced this in his prayer as he started the service. But 1 Peter 1:3 says this, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." Christians, we are called to have hope because we have a living hope. Christ did not stay dead. This is what we celebrated last week at Easter, that Christ raised from the dead. He is alive. We have a living hope, and it is practical to us in day-to-day life. It's not just a hope that we can have one day in the future. It's a hope we can have now. And I want to pause here for a second and recognize that life's not always easy. It's not always easy to have hope. I recognize that there are many brothers and sisters in this church who have gone through struggles and difficulty and are in the middle of that even right now. I know people in this body that have suffered from illness, have been diagnosed with cancer or disease. I know people in this church that have suffered from mental illness or anxiety or eating disorders. I know people in this church who have this desire for God to answer their prayers, and they've been waiting and waiting for an answer. I know people who have lost their jobs and are wondering when they're going to be able to pay the bills. I know people who are looking for housing, and like, "Don't know where I'm going to live, but I'm going to do something, I guess. I don't know." I know people who are suffering and I know many of you are. And what I am saying is God is calling us to have hope, even in that. It's not a call to suck it up and get tough. That's not what I'm saying. It's a call to recognize that we are weak and that in those moments we need help, and that God is the one who can provide it. And that God is the one who can give us hope, even when we don't see the reasons for hope. Because we are called to it through the life of Christ. We can look at Christ. We could look at what He willingly suffered for us. We could look at the way He lived for us, died for us, rose for us, and say, "You know what? Regardless of my circumstances, I could look to Christ and have hope." And as I mentioned, we're going to see in the further points of Paul's prayer, more specifically, more powerfully the thrust of why we can have hope. But Paul starts generally, we are called to it. We are called to have hope. So with that, let's pray for this church to have hope. Heavenly Father, Lord, we need you. We live in a fallen, broken world where we see the effects of sin, and where we see the pain and suffering and bitterness that comes from our own sin and from the sin in the world around us, and just from the brokenness of creation apart from Christ. Give us eyes to see the hope in those situations that only you provide. Give us eyes to see that you are with us. You love us, you are there. You have endured and suffered for us. And you are our reason for hope. Our hope is not in the solving of all the problems. Our hope is in you alone. Give us hope. We thank you. We praise you. In Jesus' name. Subpoint number two, why the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God is to recognize riches. This is the rest of verse 18. I'll just read the first part to remind us, "having the eyes of your heart enlightened," to what? "To what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints..." This made me pause and think, what is the inheritance that he is talking about here? The inheritance that Christians have is the kingdom of God. Yes, we can see it fully in eternity in heaven with eternal life with God in His presence, in His kingdom forever. That is the inheritance that Paul is talking about here. And he clarifies what he means, actually, earlier, he had already talked about, it in verses 11 through 14 of this chapter. He says this, "In him," in Christ, "we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the council of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory. In him, you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who was the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise and glory of God." We are not in heaven right now. We have not acquired possession of the kingdom of God, of this inheritance that we are given yet. But in verse 11, he says that we have obtained it. How have we obtained it if we haven't taken possession of it? Yes, we have the Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of it. But how have we obtained it? Three small words at the end of verse 18 of our text, "in the saints." In the saints, right? There's this idea with the kingdom of God, it's a idea that we talk about as an already and not yet. And the day that Jesus was raised from the dead, He already conquered sin and death. He did it, definitively, done. He already ushered in the kingdom of God here on earth. Done. But we don't see the fullness of it yet. We're waiting. We're looking forward to that day. But as we wait, what do we look for the hope and to recognize what that inheritance is? We look to each other. We look to His church, His people, the saints. Because when we look at the way the body of Christ, the church, is supposed to interact with each other, the way they love each other, support each other, pray for each other, build each other up, use their gifts for each other's good for the upbuilding of the church, we just get a little taste, get a little glimpse of what the kingdom of heaven is like. And I want to be clear. The word glimpse is my word. That's not what Paul uses. What does Paul say? Paul says, "What are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints." What Paul is saying, "Don't downplay the power that the body of believers have to be able to reveal the love of God, the kingdom of God to each other." I said glimpse because I recognize the ultimate, infinite glory of the kingdom of God in heaven whenever we get there. But Paul is saying, "The church here now is still rich and glorious. It's still able to fully reveal the kingdom of God to those who are in it and who see it." So Christians, does this describe us? Are we the riches of His glorious inheritance to each other? The way I think about it is what do we want most or long for most when we get to heaven? The right Sunday school answer, which is true and good, is that we desire the presence of God. That that's what we want when we get to heaven, is just to be in the presence of God. Good, praise God. We need that. Do we bring the presence of God with us where we go? Do we bring the characteristics, the love, the nature, who He is to each other when we interact with each other? Or are we more of our own sinful self than Christ? But if we're honest with ourselves, maybe it's a little bit more specific than just the presence of God. Maybe it's the peace of God that we're longing for in heaven. Now, there's so much uncertainty in the world around us, so much going on that we don't have peace. We're not settled here. We just can't wait for the day that we have peace in heaven. Well, if that's the case, are we bringing peace wherever we go? And when you need peace and you're struggling to see that, do you look to the other believers, the brothers and sisters in the church, who you see, you've been walking with, you know are faithful, and say, "You know what? I need peace. I don't have it. Can you help me? Can you encourage me? Can you strengthen me?" Can we be the church for each other? Maybe it's hope. Maybe you're like, "There's so much that I have going on that's suffering, that's hard, it's difficult. I can't even imagine how to have hope for the next season. And in heaven one day we won't have to worry about any of that, so I'm belonging for that." Well, do we bring hope to each other? If what you need is hope, do you have the ability to share hope with other people? And if not, do you have the humility to ask for help? Do you have the humility to go to members of your community group, to go to brothers and sisters in Christ, and say, "I'm struggling. I need hope. Can you help me?" And are we willing to help when that happens? What Paul is saying is that we need to have the eyes of our hearts open to see how great it is to be the church. It is a blessing. It is an honor, and that we can reveal all of who God is through the church. And we need to be that for each other. So with that, let's pray that we could have the eyes of our hearts opened to see the riches of God's inheritance here and now through His church, and that we can be that for each other. Heavenly Father, we need you. This is what this all comes down to, Lord, is that we need you. Open the eyes of our hearts to see how you are working in our brothers and sisters here in this church. Strengthen us, convict us on how we are called to live to exemplify the fullness of the inheritance of your kingdom in heaven while we are here on earth. Let us to live joyfully and fully in that reality that we are in your kingdom even now. Give us that hope. Give us that boldness to live that way, to be your church here and now. Open our eyes to see that, to rejoice in the riches, the fullness of it, to not look at it as something light and not view it as merely a glimpse. And then just hope for that day when we get to be with you, even though we do. Help us to see the blessing, the richness of the blessing that is your church, even here at Mosaic. We thank you. We praise you. In Jesus' name. And the last subpoint that we have is that the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God to perceive power. This is verses 19 through the rest of the chapter. I'll read just verse 19 first. It says, verse 18, "having the eyes of your heart enlightened," why? Verse 19, "to what is the immeasurable greatness of His power towards us who believe according to the working of His great might..." I love this verse. I love this verse. Paul is using as much human language as possible in this text to try and give us a sense of God's power, even though he knows no human words can ever describe the power of God. But he uses these phrases, immeasurable greatness, power, working great might in this verse to try and stoke in us an understanding of how great the power of God is. The word for immeasurable is huperballo, which is where we get the word hyperbolic from. And what it's saying is use all the hyperbolic language you want. Think as lofty and as high as you could think of anyone, any type of power, and it's not even accurate enough to describe God's power. That's not how, it's not even close to how great He is. It's immeasurable His power. But it's His greatness as well. And the word for greatness is exceeding a standard of excellence. So God is a standard of excellence, so much greater than we could ever imagine. That is who He is. That is His nature, His character. He is more excellent than we could ever measure or imagine. Then he uses the word power to describe God's working. And this word is what I characterize as gym strength, or you could think of it as potential energy. For those of you who are smarter than me and like science, it's potential energy. It's that God has the power, the ability to do, He has the ability to get things done. That's gym strength through me, right? You're not physically doing the thing, but you're preparing to be able to do whatever you need to do. You're lifting weights so that way you're prepared to do something with it whenever you need to. I'm not trying to dis gym strength. I need more gym strength myself. Pray for me for that. It's a good thing, but it's about being prepared to do something. Church, do we recognize the immeasurable excellence of God's ability to work to who? It says, "towards us who believe." God wants to work for His church, He wants to use His power to benefit Christians, to use His church to usher in the kingdom here. So when we look at the immeasurable, ultimate excellence of God's power, do we ask Him for help in times of need and recognize that He has the power to do it and that He wants to do it? And that that's the reason why He is using this power is for the benefit of those who believe in Him. But He doesn't just want to do it, He does it, that's the word working. This is kinetic energy. This is, it's happening. It's active. I call this manual labor strength. The strongest people I've ever known in my life never went to the gym. My friend Ty Harris, praise God for him. Love him. You look at him, you wouldn't think He's strong. He loves musicals. He loves singing and dancing. Great guy. I love him. He had to help someone move and lifted a pool table by himself. Now, for those of you who don't know, pool tables are solid stone. They weigh almost a ton. No, not quite a... They weigh a lot. I'm not using ton literally. They weigh a lot. It usually takes four or five people to install them. And if you have to move them up or downstairs, you usually you need to use machinery. He's just like, "Okay, go lift it up, and help people move." He has working strength. Never once in the gym, working strength. My friend Rich, his father, also Rich, Stovakin, had all of the brute ruggedness of German and Russian heritage combined. So think of the toughest German and the toughest Russian, put them together, that's him. He's like 6'7. And Rich and I would work out in his basement in high school, and we were like there curling our 20 pounds, feeling good about ourselves. And then he comes in, and is like, "what are you guys doing?" "Oh, we're lifting. Well, how much can you do?" And He's like, "I don't work out, but I'll do whatever I need to." And he starts curling a 100 pounds just for reps, just like, "I'm good." What he did for a living, he lifted bales of paper and just moved it and did it. And He was faithful in his job and he just worked for his job. God has working power. He doesn't just sit and say, "I have the ability to, I could do it if you want me to. We'll see if I do." No, He works. He does. He uses His power to help His church, His people bring His kingdom here. And the last one in the sentence is great might. The word for great is just focusing on the intensity, the magnitude of the might, of God's might. But the word for might is focusing on the ability to execute something. So God doesn't just have power to work, and then He keeps working and working and working. If you've done home projects yourself, you probably know what this is like. It takes a lot longer than you thought. And you just feel like I'm just working and working and it's never going to end. No, God executes. He completes. He does what He sets out to do. He finishes it. He finishes the work He promises to do it. He has promised to save His people. He has given us that assurance. He has promised to protect His church. He has given us that assurance. So we can trust that He will do and complete what He says. And Paul says, "You know what? Maybe you still don't understand the power of God." So He goes on to try and even more hyperbolically, explain the power of God. And we're just going to fly through verses 20 through 23. I'm just going to read the snippets of it real quick. But the next thing he says is that... Well, sorry, this is the most important thing in verse 20, "that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places..." When we look at Easter, when we look at the power that God used to raise Christ from the dead, that's the power He uses for His church. When we're talking about working power, when we're talking about Him completing and His ability, He shows us that He does it. He doesn't just tell you He's going to do it and hope that... He proves it through the resurrection of Christ. And now He's going to point out all the power of Christ to again stoke in us a desire and understanding of the ultimate supreme power of God, because Christ is seated at the right hand of the throne in heaven. The right hand is the hand of power. Whoever sits at the right hand of the king has all the power, all the authority of the king himself. So what it's saying is that Jesus Christ has the full power, full authority of our heavenly Father. Is that not enough power? Well, it's far above all rule and authority and power and dominion. I think we, like I do often, clump these together and just run through them and it's like it's a bunch of things that are powerful. God's more powerful than that. But Paul is calling out specific things here, and he clarifies what He means by them in Ephesians 6:12. He says, "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers, over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places." So rule and authority are specific positions that are being addressed, there are rules of people who rule and have authority, but then power and dominion is the force, is the power behind them. But Paul's saying, "We're not talking about flesh and blood here. We're not talking about physical earthly kings and rulers and authorities. What we can summarize all of this by is the kingdom of Satan," is what Paul is addressing here. Whether it's those who are working for the kingdom of Satan and the force behind them, whether it's demons or Satan himself. The sin and brokenness we see in this world, you compile all of that power together, and it's nothing compared to Jesus Christ. I think we often fall into thinking Satan is just the equal opposite of Christ, and that is so far from the truth. He is nothing compared to Christ. Jesus Himself alone is even more powerful than all of the kingdom of Satan could throw at Him, so much so, He's so far above and beyond that. In terms of power looking at it, He can barely even see the power of Satan, because He has none in comparison to Christ. Not only that, that not enough power for us, Jesus has the name that is above every name. The name of Satan has no power. He's not Lord Voldemort, or he who shall not be named. No, his name has no power. The name of Christ does have power. We see that in the New Testament, that the name of Christ has power to cast out demons. It has real, tangible power for those who believe. This is all in the context of those who believe. Don't want to say like you could just throw out Jesus' name and everything's going to go your way. That's not what it's about. It's about for those who believe and for the will of God. We see in the New Testament that the disciples see these people running around casting demons out in the name of Christ. And they go to Jesus and they're like, "Should we tell them to stop?" And He's like, "No, no, they're fine." Why? Well, because apparently, even though they weren't known, they had some sort of faith or trust or relationship with Christ. But then there's a time when we see people who don't have a relationship with Christ try and cast out demons in the name of Christ, and the demon says, "I do not know you," and attacks them. So study the book of Acts. It's a fun one. There's a lot that happens. But the point of all this is being is the name is not just the name you throw out and it's just like, "Okay, whatever I want is going to happen." It's that it has power for the church. It's powerful for God's people to work the will of God. To help, to protect, to bring hope, to perceive power, to understand our role in the church. The name of Christ has power unlike any other name. All things are under His feet, not just the kingdom of Satan, but everything you could think of in all of creation. Compile all the power, all the greatness, all the honor of anything in all of creation that you can think of, and it's barely even a footstool for him. Culturally, at the time when this was written, if they heard the word feet, the initial response would've been, "That's disgusting. Feet are gross." It's very similar to today. Not much has changed. I think of when my wife and I were dating, and if my feet went anywhere near, she would slap me, and jump and run away. And it's like, my feet are gross. I get it. Feet are gross. But back then, they were walking in sandals, barefoot. The dust of the road, the filth and grime that are on the streets that they're walking are just covering their feet. And that's why washing of feet was such a big deal when someone like Jesus did it for others. But what it's saying is if there was a less honorable part of Christ, which there's not, all of Christ is fully honorable, fully glorious, fully beautiful, all of the greatness of the things of this world, they barely are even able to get to His feet. They're barely even worthy of that. That's how great is the honor and power of Christ. And He's not just powerful sitting there on His throne. He is head over all things. He leads. He guides. He is in control. He is sovereign. He is working and leading and guiding His people. We can trust in His power because it's not just there and doing whatever He wants, but He is leading, guiding us in His will. And then verse 22 and 23, 23 is my actual favorite verse of this text. It says, "And He put all things under His feet and gave Him," Christ, "as head over all things to the church, the church is His body, the church, which is the fullness of Him who fills all in all." Church, do we recognize that we are called to be the fullness of Christ. Like I said, not just a glimpse. We are called to be the fullness of Him, to bring all of His power, all of His working, all of His love, His characteristics to the world. Why? Because it's not about us. He is the one who fills. We are dependent on Him. Again, going back, bringing it full circle. We are dependent on the relationship we have with Him, our love and trust for Him, to trust Him, to fill us, to open our eyes to what we need to see, to help us see where we are weak and need to be strengthened, to let Him fill us, so that the way we live can fully exemplify Him to all who see Him. Are we the fullness of God to each other? Are we the fullness of God to those who see us? We need to have the eyes of our hearts opened to see our need for His power, but also to see how His power can help us be the church today. So we'll close with prayer for that. We'll close with prayer, for us to have the eyes of our hearts open to the power of God, that fulfills us and enables us to be His church. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you are powerful. You are mighty. You are working. And you desire to do good for your church. Open the eyes of our hearts to see the greatness of the ways you are working in our lives. Lord, individually where we need to see you, open our eyes to see how you are working in our lives. Lord, corporately, with this body, your church, here, open our eyes to see how you are working powerfully for your kingdom here and now. Lord, open our eyes to see that we are called to exemplify fully you to those who see us. Fill us with your power. Fill us with your strength, not for ourselves, not for our own good, but so that we can truly be your church. We can be your people. We can bring your kingdom here and now. And that those who see it turn to you and love you. Fill us with your spirit. Fill us with your hope. Fill us with your power. We praise you, and thank you. In Jesus' name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Praying for Hope

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 16, 2023 53:01


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Good morning. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Tyler. I am the teens or youth and hospitality director here at Mosaic Boston. And whenever I get the chance to be up here, it is truly my honor and privilege to be able to deliver God's word to all of us today. So this week we're kind of in between series, and so the pastors gave me the opportunity to preach something that is on my heart and it's a message about hope. I'm calling it, Praying for Hope. We're going to be spending most of our time in the text in Ephesians. And my wife and I recently had just gone through Ephesians, and so this is something I've been thinking about, been meditating on. But even before then, this idea that we're going to see and expound upon in this text is something that God has been working in my own heart, challenging me, growing me in, and I think it's something that will benefit the church as a whole. So we're going to see what does God mean? What does God call us to pray for? But what does it mean to pray for hope in our lives and in the church in general? So before we get started, will you pray with me over the preaching of God's word? Heavenly Father, Lord, you are good. We are so thankful that we get to be here today to hear your word, to learn from you, to know you more. So Lord, we ask that in this time that you speak to us through your word, that you use me to proclaim the truth of your word for all of us. And you challenge us, you soften our hearts to see the reality of who you are and how you are working in our lives. So Lord, we thank you. We praise you. In Jesus' name. Amen. Alrighty, we will be in Ephesians 1:15-23. So if you have your Bibles, you can turn there. If not, you could follow along on the screens behind me, but I'll read the whole thing and then we'll get started. So Ephesians 1:15 says this, "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you, what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of His power towards us who believe, according to the working of His great might, that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named not only in this age, but also in the one to come. And He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all." This is the reading of God's holy, inherent, authoritative, infallible word. May He write these eternal truths upon our hearts. We're going to be spending our time in kind of three points today. The three points are actually one sentence and the third point of that sentence has three subpoints. So just to throw some chaos and difficulty into things. But the one sentence that I want you guys to take away from this is the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God. And the reason why the church should do that is to have hope, to recognize riches, and to perceive power. So that's what we're going to be spending our time in today. And so if you're like, "Wow, Tyler normally goes a long time with three points, and now He has three and three subpoints," I want to encourage you points one and two are on one page. So we'll get through those real quick. We'll spend most of the time on point number three. But point number one, the church, this is verse 15. Verse 15 says, "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints..." Who is Paul addressing here? He is addressing the church. Well, he's clarifying how he knows it's the church that he's speaking to. It's the people that have faith in the Lord Jesus and love for all the saints. This is the very basics, the very fundamental definition of the church. It's those, it's the people who have faith in the Lord Jesus and love towards all the saints. Now, a couple clarifying things. I love that it says, Lord Jesus, because I think oftentimes in my mind I focus on savior Jesus, which is good. Jesus is savior. I have faith in Jesus as my savior. Which is what we talked about last week with Easter, and we talk about every week at Mosaic, that Jesus came and died to save us from our sins and raised to life three days later to prove that He had the power to do it, to save us from our sins. We have faith in that. But He's not just savior, He's also Lord. Lord is ruler. He is Lord. He has power. He has authority over our lives today and we trust in Him as our king. We have faith in Him as our Lord and Savior. That's a Christian. And naturally, when you do that, you love the saints. So let's clarify saints. If you're like me, I grew up in a Catholic Church, and so a saint is someone who did some really incredible work and then died, and so you get to be a saint. But that's not what the word means. The word just means holy or set apart. Paul is talking about Christians. He's talking about the church. And so when we have faith in Jesus, naturally, we should love each other, we should care for each other. And so Paul is just being very clear at the start, he is addressing the church. He is talking to the church. And so everything that we're going to talk about now, he is addressing to Christians. And so if you're here today, and you're not a Christian and you're like, "Well, why am I here?" Praise God that you're here. We're very thankful that you're here. We want you to be able to see a glimpse into what we talk about when we talk about church. We're not talking about a meeting on Sundays. We're not talking about a place that we go to do the thing we're supposed to do and get on. We're talking about a faith and love of Jesus Christ and a love for each other. And what I would just ask you, humbly, in this time, if you are able to just pray and ask God, "If this is true, if you are real, if you are here, open my eyes to see you." Ask God that, "If this is true and what we are speaking about is true," ask Him to reveal himself to you. Because what we are going to see in this text is that God works powerfully in His church to help, to give hope, and to save His people. Forgot to mention real quick, we have a motto, love Jesus simple, right? That's what this text is all about. That's why we have that motto, love Jesus simple. We love God, we love His people, and we love those who do not yet recognize that they're His people. We love the church. We have love for the saints. We love God and Jesus. Specifically Jesus, not just God in general, but we love Jesus Himself. So we have faith in Jesus. We love the saints. Simple, that's all we need. That's the foundation. That's the point. That's the root of all of that. We do. End of point one, nice job, nice and easy. Point number two, the church should pray. And this is verses 16 and the beginning of 17. It says this, "I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory..." And we're going to pause there and leave you on a little bit of a cliffhanger. But Paul starts saying, "I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers..." First thing, we cannot separate thanksgiving and prayer. When we pray, thanksgiving needs to be a part of it. Whatever you are thankful for in this life, whenever something happens or you receive something or whatever, you're just reminded of something that you're thankful for, praise God for that thing. Literally, go to Him in prayer and praise Him. Thank Him for it. We cannot separate thanksgiving and prayer. But specifically what Paul is thankful for is for the church, is for other believers, brothers and sisters in Christ. Christians, we are called to be thankful for each other, so thank you. I mean that very sincerely. You don't know how much this church has been an encouragement to me, been an encouragement to the staff, been an encouragement to the pastors, to each other, been able to support and help each other throughout the many years that this church has been here. Thank you. I praise God and thank Him for you and your faithfulness to Him. And I mean that sincerely. Now, when we look at each other, do we sincerely feel that way? Let's feel that way. Let's be thankful for each other that God has blessed us with the ability to have these relationships with each other. The next thing I want to point out is that Paul is very specific in who he is praying to and why he is praying to Him. This is the beginning of verse 17, "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory...." So he's specific. Paul's not just talking to air. He's not just throwing out prayers to someone in general. He is praying to the God of our Lord Jesus Christ. He's specific. And then he throws it in and follows up with the Father of glory. Is this just some fancy phrasing that really religious people like to do so they sound nice when they pray in the letters read out loud to the church? No. What Paul is doing here is he's clarifying why He's praying and trusts this God that he's praying to. He's not just any God. He's not just any person. He's the Father of glory. I was reading a commentary on this text and it was written by a guy named Francis Foulkes, who he didn't write many commentaries, but he did on Ephesians. But most of his works were about prayer. Most of the things he wrote was like how to pray. Why do we pray? What does it look like to pray? Things like that. And I thought that he would be a very helpful person to study in these texts. And this is what he says about Paul's address of God. He says, "He is the Father to whom all glory belongs; for all the power and majesty revealed in creation, providence and redemption are His, and He the source. Such a thought of who God is gives to prayer a sense of awe and strengthens the faith in those who pray." Christians, we should strengthen our faith when we pray. It actually matters how we address God when we pray. It doesn't mean that we have to say, "The Father of glory," that's not the point. For me personally, when I prayed, I said, "Heavenly Father," that's what I usually say. You don't have to say that either. But I say that, because I'm reminding myself, yeah, I'm praying to God who is in heaven. He is above all things. He rules. He reigns. That's who He is. But He's not just in heaven. He's a father. He's relational. He knows us. He cares for us. We can have relationship with Him. And so I start, when I pray that way because I'm reminding myself, I'm speaking to the God who has a relationship with me, and He has power to do things. He has power to hear me. I trust He will hear me. I trust that He can act on what I'm asking of Him. I trust and grow in my awe and faith of Him. And so this isn't to say that's how we all need to pray, but what we all need to do is go to God in awe and reverence. Go to Him and prepare our hearts when we pray to say, yeah, I am speaking to the one true all powerful God. That matters. That makes a difference. And so when we are in times of questioning, times of doubt, times of weakness still go to God in strength, not our own strength, but we can go to Him saying, "God, I know I'm weak, but you're strong. God, I'm weak, but I'm reminding myself of who you are. I'm reminding myself of how you've been faithful to me." And so that regardless of our season in life, we can pray in strength, because it's God's strength, not our own that we pray in. And then from this point on in our text, Paul is going to launch into specifics that he prays over the church. So he's writing this letter to remind them and encourage them. He is praying for them and he's going to tell them specifically what He's praying about. And as we continue through these texts, we're going to see what are those specific things, and we're going to stop and we're going to pray for those things for this church. Why? Because Paul thought it was important to pray over the church in Ephesus. And if God thought it was important enough to canonize in scripture, I think it's something good that we should pray for ourselves as well. Plus, I know that it is something good for us to pray for ourselves as well. But real quick before we continue with that, I want to point something out, and this is something that I learned only a couple years ago and was never explicitly taught to me. And I was like, "Wow, why was this never explicitly taught? This is really important." When anyone, myself or a pastor or someone else is up here preaching and praying, or if you're in a small group and one person is praying and you're just there listening, we're all praying. And what I mean by that is it's not a time to just sit and listen and think, "Okay, do I like what he's saying?" Or, "That sounds good or nice? I like that wording." That's not the point. But it's the time of Christians to be led by one person to pray to God together about the same things. That's why the word amen matters. If you don't know the word, amen means truly. You're saying that you agree with everything that was said and you're praying it. So we've all done this, I'm guilty of this as well, but if you've ever been in a prayer group and someone's praying and it's late and you're tired and your mind starts drifting and you don't really hear anything that they're saying, and then the end comes and everyone's like, "Amen," you're like, "Amen. Amen." You just lied and you're guilty of lying. So what I'm saying is that as we talk about these things, I'm asking that we as a church pray together for God to bless His church with these things. It's not about me standing up here praying these things. It's about us as the body of Christ praying together in unity and seeking God for His help. So with that, that's the end of point two, on to point three. Wow, we're flying through this. Point three, the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God. This is verses 17 through the end. I'm just going to read the first part of it for us. But "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened." We'll stop there for now. So Paul's first request to God in prayer for the church is for us, for that church, but applicable to us as well, to have a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. Everything else that we're going to talk about, all of the rest of the requests of Paul are summarized in this point. He gets more specific as to why it matters as he goes along, but this is the heart of it. What Paul really wants for the church is to have a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the knowledge of God. So what does that mean? What is the spirit of wisdom in the knowledge of God? Well, wisdom is knowledge applied, right? Wisdom is about how we act based on information that we have. So you can classify it as a spirit to know God's will. The ability to know what God wants for us, for His people, for His church, for us to do. And then what is the spirit of a revelation in the knowledge of him? This is a spirit to know God, to see God. Well, Paul, you're writing to Christians, don't they already know God? Why are you asking for a spirit of revelation in the knowledge of him? Because we all can know God deeper, better, and more personal. Again, Francis Foulkes in His commentary on this section says this, "Such wisdom and revelation, moreover, come, not simply as such higher intelligence is given from God, but by the knowledge of Him, the personal knowledge of God Himself, which in the Bible always connotes the experience of life in union and fellowship with Him. Paul put the prayer for wisdom first, because to him the gospel was so wonderful that it was impossible for people to see the glory of it unless they were taught by God, and also because he knew that the knowledge of God was life itself." So when put that way, does it make sense to pray for a spirit, to pray for more revelation of God so that we can have greater unity with Him in this life, that we can have greater fellowship with Him in life? Yes, of course, it does. Well, how does that happen? How do we receive the spirit of wisdom and the spirit of revelation and the knowledge of him? It's the next verse that says, "having the eyes of your hearts enlightened that you may know," right? It's not that God is suddenly going to be someone more of Himself than He was so you could recognize it. He's always there. He's always there. We need to recognize Him there. We need to see how He is working. See who He is. We need to have the eyes of our hearts enlightened. What does that phrase mean, eyes of our hearts? Our hearts don't have eyes, that just doesn't make sense. Well, the only way you think of your heart is as a beating organ, you're probably the first person in all of history. Because every single culture talks about the heart, not just as a beating organ, but also as more than that, as part of who you are about emotions and desires. But what Paul is saying with the eyes of your heart, it's saying, "Let all of who you are, the truest part of you, your soul, everything that you are, have that open, your eyes open to see who God is, to see who He is, and how He is working His will and His revelation in your life." And we need to have our eyes opened, because we can't do it ourselves, right? We all know this experientially that we can see things and not actually understand what they are, or we can hear things and not understand what you're supposed to take away from it. During first service, it came to me that there's a really good example of this in art for me. I can look at art, I could see there's painting and brushes and whatever, and I just don't get it. It's art. Cool, that's nice. But I understand that there is beauty in it and that some people do get it. And so I need to have the eyes of my heart enlightened. There's a painting or a picture in our office space that Raquel, God bless, who God has used powerfully in this church and has blessed her, but Raquel loves this painting and I look at it, I'm like, "I don't get it." It makes me angry that I don't... Anyway, but she gets it. So I just need to have the eyes of my heart enlightened to the truth of the beauty of that painting. But anyway, I bring that up to say we all know what it means to see something and not get it. And what Paul is praying for the church is that we're not that way with God, that we can see Him and we can get Him, and we can see the fullness of Him and grow in our relationship with Him. And we need God to do that for us. We see this idea also in Isaiah 6:9-10, it says, "'Keep on hearing but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed." It's a very difficult text, but what it's saying is that God is the one who has the power to open people's eyes. And so if we need our eyes open to the reality of God, let's go to Him. Let's ask him. Let's ask Him to reveal Himself to us. And if you're here today and you're not a Christian, this is what I urge you, ask God, open your eyes. Ask God to reveal himself to you, to show you to reveal His love, His grace, His mercy, and His power through the work of Christ for you. And he ends this part by saying, "that you may know..." And then he continues with what He's praying for. We need the eyes of our hearts opened and enlightened, not so that we could have an idea about what God is like, so that we can know Him, that we can know the hope that He gives us, that we can know what the inheritance is, that we can have confidence in Him. It's not a wishy-washy thing, but we could have confidence in Him. That's what God wants for us, and we need Him to open our eyes to it. So as the first thing that Paul is praying for the church, let's now spend some time praying for us, this body, this church here to receive wisdom, a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of God. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we need you. We need more of you, and we need to see you. Open the eyes of our hearts to wherever we are blind to you and who you are and the way you are working in our lives. Give us eyes to see you. Lord, wherever we are blind, wherever we are stubborn, where wherever we are hardhearted, soften us and open our eyes to know you more. Grow our relationship with you. Lord, we know you desire the deepest relationship with us. Give us hearts that desire the deepest relationship with you to know you personally, to love you personally. Bless this body of believers, your church here with the deepest growth in relationship and love for you. Thank you. In Jesus' name, amen. So now He's going to get into three subpoints for why we should have a spirit of wisdom and revelation of God. So the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God, subpoint number one, to have hope. To have hope. And each of the subpoints is going to get a little bit more specific, but they're all relating back to this idea of hope. And they're going to be ways that Paul shows that we as the body, we as Christians, can have hope. So this is in verse 18 where it says, "having the eyes of your hearts enlightened that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you..." Have you ever thought about hope that way, as you're calling? Christians, you are called to have hope. We are not called to despair. We are not called to anxiety. We are called to hope. And not just any kind of hope, a living hope. Pastor Shane referenced this in his prayer as he started the service. But 1 Peter 1:3 says this, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." Christians, we are called to have hope because we have a living hope. Christ did not stay dead. This is what we celebrated last week at Easter, that Christ raised from the dead. He is alive. We have a living hope, and it is practical to us in day-to-day life. It's not just a hope that we can have one day in the future. It's a hope we can have now. And I want to pause here for a second and recognize that life's not always easy. It's not always easy to have hope. I recognize that there are many brothers and sisters in this church who have gone through struggles and difficulty and are in the middle of that even right now. I know people in this body that have suffered from illness, have been diagnosed with cancer or disease. I know people in this church that have suffered from mental illness or anxiety or eating disorders. I know people in this church who have this desire for God to answer their prayers, and they've been waiting and waiting for an answer. I know people who have lost their jobs and are wondering when they're going to be able to pay the bills. I know people who are looking for housing, and like, "Don't know where I'm going to live, but I'm going to do something, I guess. I don't know." I know people who are suffering and I know many of you are. And what I am saying is God is calling us to have hope, even in that. It's not a call to suck it up and get tough. That's not what I'm saying. It's a call to recognize that we are weak and that in those moments we need help, and that God is the one who can provide it. And that God is the one who can give us hope, even when we don't see the reasons for hope. Because we are called to it through the life of Christ. We can look at Christ. We could look at what He willingly suffered for us. We could look at the way He lived for us, died for us, rose for us, and say, "You know what? Regardless of my circumstances, I could look to Christ and have hope." And as I mentioned, we're going to see in the further points of Paul's prayer, more specifically, more powerfully the thrust of why we can have hope. But Paul starts generally, we are called to it. We are called to have hope. So with that, let's pray for this church to have hope. Heavenly Father, Lord, we need you. We live in a fallen, broken world where we see the effects of sin, and where we see the pain and suffering and bitterness that comes from our own sin and from the sin in the world around us, and just from the brokenness of creation apart from Christ. Give us eyes to see the hope in those situations that only you provide. Give us eyes to see that you are with us. You love us, you are there. You have endured and suffered for us. And you are our reason for hope. Our hope is not in the solving of all the problems. Our hope is in you alone. Give us hope. We thank you. We praise you. In Jesus' name. Subpoint number two, why the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God is to recognize riches. This is the rest of verse 18. I'll just read the first part to remind us, "having the eyes of your heart enlightened," to what? "To what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints..." This made me pause and think, what is the inheritance that he is talking about here? The inheritance that Christians have is the kingdom of God. Yes, we can see it fully in eternity in heaven with eternal life with God in His presence, in His kingdom forever. That is the inheritance that Paul is talking about here. And he clarifies what he means, actually, earlier, he had already talked about, it in verses 11 through 14 of this chapter. He says this, "In him," in Christ, "we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the council of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory. In him, you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who was the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise and glory of God." We are not in heaven right now. We have not acquired possession of the kingdom of God, of this inheritance that we are given yet. But in verse 11, he says that we have obtained it. How have we obtained it if we haven't taken possession of it? Yes, we have the Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of it. But how have we obtained it? Three small words at the end of verse 18 of our text, "in the saints." In the saints, right? There's this idea with the kingdom of God, it's a idea that we talk about as an already and not yet. And the day that Jesus was raised from the dead, He already conquered sin and death. He did it, definitively, done. He already ushered in the kingdom of God here on earth. Done. But we don't see the fullness of it yet. We're waiting. We're looking forward to that day. But as we wait, what do we look for the hope and to recognize what that inheritance is? We look to each other. We look to His church, His people, the saints. Because when we look at the way the body of Christ, the church, is supposed to interact with each other, the way they love each other, support each other, pray for each other, build each other up, use their gifts for each other's good for the upbuilding of the church, we just get a little taste, get a little glimpse of what the kingdom of heaven is like. And I want to be clear. The word glimpse is my word. That's not what Paul uses. What does Paul say? Paul says, "What are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints." What Paul is saying, "Don't downplay the power that the body of believers have to be able to reveal the love of God, the kingdom of God to each other." I said glimpse because I recognize the ultimate, infinite glory of the kingdom of God in heaven whenever we get there. But Paul is saying, "The church here now is still rich and glorious. It's still able to fully reveal the kingdom of God to those who are in it and who see it." So Christians, does this describe us? Are we the riches of His glorious inheritance to each other? The way I think about it is what do we want most or long for most when we get to heaven? The right Sunday school answer, which is true and good, is that we desire the presence of God. That that's what we want when we get to heaven, is just to be in the presence of God. Good, praise God. We need that. Do we bring the presence of God with us where we go? Do we bring the characteristics, the love, the nature, who He is to each other when we interact with each other? Or are we more of our own sinful self than Christ? But if we're honest with ourselves, maybe it's a little bit more specific than just the presence of God. Maybe it's the peace of God that we're longing for in heaven. Now, there's so much uncertainty in the world around us, so much going on that we don't have peace. We're not settled here. We just can't wait for the day that we have peace in heaven. Well, if that's the case, are we bringing peace wherever we go? And when you need peace and you're struggling to see that, do you look to the other believers, the brothers and sisters in the church, who you see, you've been walking with, you know are faithful, and say, "You know what? I need peace. I don't have it. Can you help me? Can you encourage me? Can you strengthen me?" Can we be the church for each other? Maybe it's hope. Maybe you're like, "There's so much that I have going on that's suffering, that's hard, it's difficult. I can't even imagine how to have hope for the next season. And in heaven one day we won't have to worry about any of that, so I'm belonging for that." Well, do we bring hope to each other? If what you need is hope, do you have the ability to share hope with other people? And if not, do you have the humility to ask for help? Do you have the humility to go to members of your community group, to go to brothers and sisters in Christ, and say, "I'm struggling. I need hope. Can you help me?" And are we willing to help when that happens? What Paul is saying is that we need to have the eyes of our hearts open to see how great it is to be the church. It is a blessing. It is an honor, and that we can reveal all of who God is through the church. And we need to be that for each other. So with that, let's pray that we could have the eyes of our hearts opened to see the riches of God's inheritance here and now through His church, and that we can be that for each other. Heavenly Father, we need you. This is what this all comes down to, Lord, is that we need you. Open the eyes of our hearts to see how you are working in our brothers and sisters here in this church. Strengthen us, convict us on how we are called to live to exemplify the fullness of the inheritance of your kingdom in heaven while we are here on earth. Let us to live joyfully and fully in that reality that we are in your kingdom even now. Give us that hope. Give us that boldness to live that way, to be your church here and now. Open our eyes to see that, to rejoice in the riches, the fullness of it, to not look at it as something light and not view it as merely a glimpse. And then just hope for that day when we get to be with you, even though we do. Help us to see the blessing, the richness of the blessing that is your church, even here at Mosaic. We thank you. We praise you. In Jesus' name. And the last subpoint that we have is that the church should pray for wisdom and revelation of God to perceive power. This is verses 19 through the rest of the chapter. I'll read just verse 19 first. It says, verse 18, "having the eyes of your heart enlightened," why? Verse 19, "to what is the immeasurable greatness of His power towards us who believe according to the working of His great might..." I love this verse. I love this verse. Paul is using as much human language as possible in this text to try and give us a sense of God's power, even though he knows no human words can ever describe the power of God. But he uses these phrases, immeasurable greatness, power, working great might in this verse to try and stoke in us an understanding of how great the power of God is. The word for immeasurable is huperballo, which is where we get the word hyperbolic from. And what it's saying is use all the hyperbolic language you want. Think as lofty and as high as you could think of anyone, any type of power, and it's not even accurate enough to describe God's power. That's not how, it's not even close to how great He is. It's immeasurable His power. But it's His greatness as well. And the word for greatness is exceeding a standard of excellence. So God is a standard of excellence, so much greater than we could ever imagine. That is who He is. That is His nature, His character. He is more excellent than we could ever measure or imagine. Then he uses the word power to describe God's working. And this word is what I characterize as gym strength, or you could think of it as potential energy. For those of you who are smarter than me and like science, it's potential energy. It's that God has the power, the ability to do, He has the ability to get things done. That's gym strength through me, right? You're not physically doing the thing, but you're preparing to be able to do whatever you need to do. You're lifting weights so that way you're prepared to do something with it whenever you need to. I'm not trying to dis gym strength. I need more gym strength myself. Pray for me for that. It's a good thing, but it's about being prepared to do something. Church, do we recognize the immeasurable excellence of God's ability to work to who? It says, "towards us who believe." God wants to work for His church, He wants to use His power to benefit Christians, to use His church to usher in the kingdom here. So when we look at the immeasurable, ultimate excellence of God's power, do we ask Him for help in times of need and recognize that He has the power to do it and that He wants to do it? And that that's the reason why He is using this power is for the benefit of those who believe in Him. But He doesn't just want to do it, He does it, that's the word working. This is kinetic energy. This is, it's happening. It's active. I call this manual labor strength. The strongest people I've ever known in my life never went to the gym. My friend Ty Harris, praise God for him. Love him. You look at him, you wouldn't think He's strong. He loves musicals. He loves singing and dancing. Great guy. I love him. He had to help someone move and lifted a pool table by himself. Now, for those of you who don't know, pool tables are solid stone. They weigh almost a ton. No, not quite a... They weigh a lot. I'm not using ton literally. They weigh a lot. It usually takes four or five people to install them. And if you have to move them up or downstairs, you usually you need to use machinery. He's just like, "Okay, go lift it up, and help people move." He has working strength. Never once in the gym, working strength. My friend Rich, his father, also Rich, Stovakin, had all of the brute ruggedness of German and Russian heritage combined. So think of the toughest German and the toughest Russian, put them together, that's him. He's like 6'7. And Rich and I would work out in his basement in high school, and we were like there curling our 20 pounds, feeling good about ourselves. And then he comes in, and is like, "what are you guys doing?" "Oh, we're lifting. Well, how much can you do?" And He's like, "I don't work out, but I'll do whatever I need to." And he starts curling a 100 pounds just for reps, just like, "I'm good." What he did for a living, he lifted bales of paper and just moved it and did it. And He was faithful in his job and he just worked for his job. God has working power. He doesn't just sit and say, "I have the ability to, I could do it if you want me to. We'll see if I do." No, He works. He does. He uses His power to help His church, His people bring His kingdom here. And the last one in the sentence is great might. The word for great is just focusing on the intensity, the magnitude of the might, of God's might. But the word for might is focusing on the ability to execute something. So God doesn't just have power to work, and then He keeps working and working and working. If you've done home projects yourself, you probably know what this is like. It takes a lot longer than you thought. And you just feel like I'm just working and working and it's never going to end. No, God executes. He completes. He does what He sets out to do. He finishes it. He finishes the work He promises to do it. He has promised to save His people. He has given us that assurance. He has promised to protect His church. He has given us that assurance. So we can trust that He will do and complete what He says. And Paul says, "You know what? Maybe you still don't understand the power of God." So He goes on to try and even more hyperbolically, explain the power of God. And we're just going to fly through verses 20 through 23. I'm just going to read the snippets of it real quick. But the next thing he says is that... Well, sorry, this is the most important thing in verse 20, "that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places..." When we look at Easter, when we look at the power that God used to raise Christ from the dead, that's the power He uses for His church. When we're talking about working power, when we're talking about Him completing and His ability, He shows us that He does it. He doesn't just tell you He's going to do it and hope that... He proves it through the resurrection of Christ. And now He's going to point out all the power of Christ to again stoke in us a desire and understanding of the ultimate supreme power of God, because Christ is seated at the right hand of the throne in heaven. The right hand is the hand of power. Whoever sits at the right hand of the king has all the power, all the authority of the king himself. So what it's saying is that Jesus Christ has the full power, full authority of our heavenly Father. Is that not enough power? Well, it's far above all rule and authority and power and dominion. I think we, like I do often, clump these together and just run through them and it's like it's a bunch of things that are powerful. God's more powerful than that. But Paul is calling out specific things here, and he clarifies what He means by them in Ephesians 6:12. He says, "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers, over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places." So rule and authority are specific positions that are being addressed, there are rules of people who rule and have authority, but then power and dominion is the force, is the power behind them. But Paul's saying, "We're not talking about flesh and blood here. We're not talking about physical earthly kings and rulers and authorities. What we can summarize all of this by is the kingdom of Satan," is what Paul is addressing here. Whether it's those who are working for the kingdom of Satan and the force behind them, whether it's demons or Satan himself. The sin and brokenness we see in this world, you compile all of that power together, and it's nothing compared to Jesus Christ. I think we often fall into thinking Satan is just the equal opposite of Christ, and that is so far from the truth. He is nothing compared to Christ. Jesus Himself alone is even more powerful than all of the kingdom of Satan could throw at Him, so much so, He's so far above and beyond that. In terms of power looking at it, He can barely even see the power of Satan, because He has none in comparison to Christ. Not only that, that not enough power for us, Jesus has the name that is above every name. The name of Satan has no power. He's not Lord Voldemort, or he who shall not be named. No, his name has no power. The name of Christ does have power. We see that in the New Testament, that the name of Christ has power to cast out demons. It has real, tangible power for those who believe. This is all in the context of those who believe. Don't want to say like you could just throw out Jesus' name and everything's going to go your way. That's not what it's about. It's about for those who believe and for the will of God. We see in the New Testament that the disciples see these people running around casting demons out in the name of Christ. And they go to Jesus and they're like, "Should we tell them to stop?" And He's like, "No, no, they're fine." Why? Well, because apparently, even though they weren't known, they had some sort of faith or trust or relationship with Christ. But then there's a time when we see people who don't have a relationship with Christ try and cast out demons in the name of Christ, and the demon says, "I do not know you," and attacks them. So study the book of Acts. It's a fun one. There's a lot that happens. But the point of all this is being is the name is not just the name you throw out and it's just like, "Okay, whatever I want is going to happen." It's that it has power for the church. It's powerful for God's people to work the will of God. To help, to protect, to bring hope, to perceive power, to understand our role in the church. The name of Christ has power unlike any other name. All things are under His feet, not just the kingdom of Satan, but everything you could think of in all of creation. Compile all the power, all the greatness, all the honor of anything in all of creation that you can think of, and it's barely even a footstool for him. Culturally, at the time when this was written, if they heard the word feet, the initial response would've been, "That's disgusting. Feet are gross." It's very similar to today. Not much has changed. I think of when my wife and I were dating, and if my feet went anywhere near, she would slap me, and jump and run away. And it's like, my feet are gross. I get it. Feet are gross. But back then, they were walking in sandals, barefoot. The dust of the road, the filth and grime that are on the streets that they're walking are just covering their feet. And that's why washing of feet was such a big deal when someone like Jesus did it for others. But what it's saying is if there was a less honorable part of Christ, which there's not, all of Christ is fully honorable, fully glorious, fully beautiful, all of the greatness of the things of this world, they barely are even able to get to His feet. They're barely even worthy of that. That's how great is the honor and power of Christ. And He's not just powerful sitting there on His throne. He is head over all things. He leads. He guides. He is in control. He is sovereign. He is working and leading and guiding His people. We can trust in His power because it's not just there and doing whatever He wants, but He is leading, guiding us in His will. And then verse 22 and 23, 23 is my actual favorite verse of this text. It says, "And He put all things under His feet and gave Him," Christ, "as head over all things to the church, the church is His body, the church, which is the fullness of Him who fills all in all." Church, do we recognize that we are called to be the fullness of Christ. Like I said, not just a glimpse. We are called to be the fullness of Him, to bring all of His power, all of His working, all of His love, His characteristics to the world. Why? Because it's not about us. He is the one who fills. We are dependent on Him. Again, going back, bringing it full circle. We are dependent on the relationship we have with Him, our love and trust for Him, to trust Him, to fill us, to open our eyes to what we need to see, to help us see where we are weak and need to be strengthened, to let Him fill us, so that the way we live can fully exemplify Him to all who see Him. Are we the fullness of God to each other? Are we the fullness of God to those who see us? We need to have the eyes of our hearts opened to see our need for His power, but also to see how His power can help us be the church today. So we'll close with prayer for that. We'll close with prayer, for us to have the eyes of our hearts open to the power of God, that fulfills us and enables us to be His church. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you are powerful. You are mighty. You are working. And you desire to do good for your church. Open the eyes of our hearts to see the greatness of the ways you are working in our lives. Lord, individually where we need to see you, open our eyes to see how you are working in our lives. Lord, corporately, with this body, your church, here, open our eyes to see how you are working powerfully for your kingdom here and now. Lord, open our eyes to see that we are called to exemplify fully you to those who see us. Fill us with your power. Fill us with your strength, not for ourselves, not for our own good, but so that we can truly be your church. We can be your people. We can bring your kingdom here and now. And that those who see it turn to you and love you. Fill us with your spirit. Fill us with your hope. Fill us with your power. We praise you, and thank you. In Jesus' name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Christ Is Risen

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 9, 2023 40:30


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com Before we begin, first of all, everyone looks great. Elephant in the room, I'm wearing a suit. I told my brother Chidi before our service, "There's only three ways you're going to see this. Someone needs to get married, someone needs to die, or someone needs to rise from the dead." And praise God, we get to celebrate all three. That Jesus Christ came, He lived, He died, He rose from the dead, He is coming again to take His bride home to eternity, to the wedding supper of the lamb. We look forward to that. And before we begin today, there's something we got to do. If you've been around Mosaic for a while, you know what's coming. Hopefully you got warmed up on your way to church this morning. And we're going to do a little bit of a call and response. And so if you're new to Mosaic, if this is your first time here, what we're going to do is I'm going to say, "He is risen." And then we're all going to say together, "He is risen indeed." We're going to do that three times, each time with more emphatically, as loud as you want. So is everybody ready? All right, Here we go. He is risen. He is risen indeed.He is risen.He is risen indeed.He is risen.He is risen indeed. Praise God. Jesus is alive. He is risen. He is reigning. He is seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven. He's coming again to judge the living and the dead. These are the facts of the matter. This is the truth of the matter. And the question that I want to put before us this morning, however, is if this is the truth of the matter, why does it matter? What does it mean? What are the implications of such a thing? How does a man rising from the dead 2,000 years ago impact us today? And if you go to our website, we probably have at least a dozen sermons out there archived on our website that look at the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The evidence is there. And if that's not something that you've examined, if that's something in you're interested in, I would encourage you to go and to examine the evidence. There are so many resources out there that look at that and that prove the veracity of Christianity, that Jesus Christ really did rise from the dead. But the question is why does it matter? And it matters because if this is just a nice story, a fable, a myth, a legend for children, if Jesus was just a nice guy who did some nice things, He died and that was it, then the reality is that really nothing in life matters. Not in any objective sense. That ultimately life is meaningless and that ultimately death is coming and it's going to have the last laugh. But if Christ is risen, well then that changes everything. Because if Christ is risen, then everything matters. Your life matters, my life matters, our lives matter. Our choices matter. Every moment that we have matters. It's loaded with potential that could send ripples throughout all of eternity. It matters. So if you have your Bibles, we're going to be in the Gospel of John today. If you turn to the New Testament, it's Matthew, Mark, Luke, and then John. We're going to be in John chapter 20. And this chapter, it tells us about a couple of interactions that took place between Jesus and His disciples on that first Easter Sunday. And as we look at the story, we're going to see just the life changing difference that His resurrection made for them on that day and the life changing difference that it continues to make for us on this day and every day. And so here in a moment, I'm going to read a couple verses from John chapter 20 to get us started. But before we do, before we get into our text today, I want us to all try to get into the disciples' shoes today, to put ourselves in their place, to get in the mindset that they were in. That for the last three years of our lives, we have been following our rabbi Jesus all over the place, wherever He goes. And during this time, we have learned the truth and the wisdom of His profound teaching. We have observed the integrity and the purity of His life and His character. And we've seen Him do things that we thought were impossible. He's walked on water, He's healed the sick. He has given sight to the blind. A couple of weeks ago, we even saw Him raise a man from the dead. And all of this, for the past three years, this has been our lives all kind of leading up to the zenith, to pinnacle that we reached just one week ago as we walked with this man into the city of Jerusalem. And as we did, He's greeted by crowds of people from all over the world, shouting, "Hosanna." And waving palm branches that at last their great expectations have come to fruition. That this is the king. This is the one we've been waiting for. This is the Messiah, God's chosen one who has come to save His people. We began our week just a few days ago with the euphoria of Palm Sunday of the triumphal entry. And as we walked into the city of Jerusalem that day, a whole new world of possibilities opened up before our very eyes. We began our week with that elation only to end our week with the horrors of Good Friday, to have that door slammed violently back into our face. And we watched helplessly as our teacher, our friend, our king, our hope for the world was betrayed, arrested, falsely accused, viciously beaten, mocked, flogged and crucified, nailed to a cross. We watched as they sealed His cold dead body into a cold, dark grave. And you try to imagine the spectrum of emotions that we would be feeling right now as His disciples. Your best friend is dead. More than that, your Messiah is dead. With Him, the mission is dead. Our purpose in life is dead. Our hope for the world, our hope for the future is dead. And realistically, you're probably beginning to wonder about this time, "How long is it before the rest of us are dead as well?" And I say all this because as we turn to our text and read about that first Easter Sunday, we don't find the disciples all nice sharply dressed, excited, ready to go out for a nice Easter brunch. We find them sleepless, anxious, nauseated, and terrified. We find them with bloodshot eyes and with garments that have been stained with tears. We find them hiding in a cold, dark room behind a closed locked door. And John tells us in his gospel that they were hiding and they were afraid. Afraid for their lives, afraid that all had been lost, afraid that their mission had failed, afraid that after everything that they had been through that nothing really changed. And then Jesus Christ steps into the room and they realize nothing is ever going to be the same. Jesus was alive. And that this changes everything.So if you have your Bibles, we're going to work our way through John chapter 20. And I'm going to begin just by reading a couple of verses from the middle of the chapter. John 20:19&20. The Apostle John tells us that, "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked were the disciples were for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and He stood among them and He said to them, 'Peace be with you.' And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord." Now the first change, the first difference that we see from this encounter with Jesus, that Christ is risen, therefore fear has been overcome by peace. That Jesus stepped out of the tomb of His death and into the room, into the tomb of their anxiety. And in doing so, He lands a death blow to all of their fears, that He stands there before them as the ultimate undeniable proof that nothing in this life, not even crucifixion, not even death itself, could put an end to the mission, could put an end to God's plan of salvation. See, we need to understand that when Jesus died, the disciples, all their hopes and dreams died with Him. They were shattered, dashed to the ground, pounded into dust, burned into ashes, blown away by the wind. They were gone, hopeless. The problem is not that the disciples had set their hopes too high, it's actually that up until this point, they had been setting their hopes way too low, that they were hoping for a messiah who could come and maybe help them escape their problems, help them to escape their enemies. Jesus hadn't come for that. Jesus did not come to merely escape death. He came to face it head on, to experience it and to defeat it. He had not come to overthrow the feeble Roman Empire. He had come to overthrow the dominion of darkness, to rise in victory over Satan, sin and death. And in doing so, to declare to the world, to offer to the world terms of peace, to a world that was ravaged by war, ravaged by sin. So when Jesus tells His disciples, "Peace be with you.", He's not promising them that their problems are all just going to immediately disappear and go away. But He is promising them that despite all of these problems, that despite all of their trials, all the tribulations, all the persecutions that they face, that they would ultimately overcome. Apostle Paul in writing about these things in Romans 8:31, he says, "Therefore, what shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It's God who justifies us. Who is to condemn us? Christ Jesus is the one who died, more than that, who is raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" And he says, "Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or swords?" He says, "As it's written for your sake, we are being killed all the day long. We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. No, in all of these things, we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. "For...", he says, "... I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God. In Christ Jesus, our Lord." Jesus is alive. And this doesn't mean that the battle is over, but it does certainly mean that the war has been won. So as we fight this good fight of faith, we can do so with peace, with hope, with joy. We can do so knowing, as Paul tells us in just a few chapters later in Romans 16:20, that, "The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet." And this is the heart of the matter, that the true peace that we need, it is not just peace with the superficial circumstances of our life, the true peace we need more than anything else, it is peace with God and everything else is rooted in that peace. It's the peace of knowing that we have been forgiven, that we have been justified by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, and therefore no weapon formed against us can prosper. No accusation of the enemy brought against us can stand because Jesus Christ on His throne at the right hand of the Father interceding for us. So there's nothing we need to fear in this life. There's nothing that we need to fear and death because nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Now Paul says in Romans 5:1, he says, "Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we also obtain access by faith into this grace in which we stand and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God." Verse three says, "Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces, that it is not vain. It is doing something productive. Suffering produces endurance." And he says, "Endurance produces character and character produces hope. And hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through His Holy Spirit who's been given to us." So therefore, if we are to face this battle, we do so knowing that our king is with us, that He loves us, and that He is leading us to certain victory. And even if we are to fall in this battle, we do so knowing that our king has gone before us, He has defeated death and He now holds the keys to eternal life. And so let's take that from up here and let's bring that down to earth like practically and personally. How peaceful is your life right now? The peace that we're talking about is objectively true for all who have been born again through faith in Jesus Christ. But are you experiencing it? Are you living in it day today? Well, a few verses earlier in John chapter 20, we read about another encounter that Jesus had with another one of his disciples, his disciple, Mary Magdalene, that early that morning she had gone to the tomb and she gets there and she finds it empty. And as we see her in verse 11, we're told that, "Mary stood there weeping outside of the tomb, and as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. And they said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping?' And when she said to them, 'Well, they've taken away my Lord and I don't know where they've laid Him.' And having said this, she turned around and she saw Jesus standing, but she did not know it was Jesus. "Jesus said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?' And supposing Him to be the gardener, she said to Him, 'Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you've laid Him and I will go and I will take Him away.' And Jesus said to her, 'Mary.' And she turned and said to Him in Aramaic, 'Rabboni.', which means teacher. And Jesus her, 'Do not clinging to me for I've not yet ascended to the Father, but go to my brothers and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and to your Father, to my God and your God.'" Mary Magdalene went and she announced this good news to the disciples. This is a pretty familiar story that you often hear on Easter Sunday and it's a familiar story. But the question that I want us to ask ourselves, the question I want you to ask yourself this morning is we see two very different Marys in this passage from beginning to end, one who is stricken with anxiety, with fear, and one who is overcome with peace and with joy. And are you more like the Mary that we see anxious and distraught, weeping at the tomb of your shattered hopes? Or are you more like the Mary that we see weeping tears of joy worshiping at the feet of her risen savior, her living hope? Because a lack of peace, well it comes from a misplaced hope. You're building on a shaky foundation. And that's what Mary really, she'd come to that tomb and her hopes had been shattered and she needed to find a better hope. She needed to find a living hope that she had hoped for a savior that could avoid death. Well, she needed a savior that could defeat death. Because Mary, her biggest problem was that she didn't so much need to be saved from her enemies nearly as much as she needed to be saved from herself, saved from her sin. And the only way that Jesus could do that for her was by laying down His life, going to the cross and first dying in her place so then therefore He could rise in victory over Satan, sin and death to offer her this peace. And Jesus offers us peace. If you're not experiencing this in your life right now, however, well, I think Jesus would ask us the same thing He asked Mary, "Why? Why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?" If you're anxious, if you are afraid, perhaps you've been building your hope on a shaky foundation. Perhaps you've been looking for the wrong things in the wrong places. You've been looking for maybe a Jesus that could save you from your circumstances, where what you need more than anything else is a Jesus who can come and save you from yourself, from your pride, from your self-righteousness, from your self-reliance, from the sin that separates us from our father, that that places this wedge, that drives this chasm between us and God. Because Jesus Christ is the king of kings. He is the Lord of lords. Jesus is the Prince of Peace objectively, but you're only going to experience that peace personally when He is seated in his proper place, not on a throne in Jerusalem, but on the throne of your heart. In Colossians 3:15, Paul says, "Therefore, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful." Paul says again in the book of Philippians, "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God." In verse seven, he says, "And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." So the first thing that we see is that Christ has risen, therefore fear can be overcome by peace. Now the second point we see is that Christ is risen, therefore futility has been overcome by purpose. So picking up again in John 20:19 it says, "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and He stood among them and He said to them, 'Peace be with you.' And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side, and the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord." In verse 21, "Jesus said to them again, 'Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me even so I am sending you.' And when He had said this, He breathed on them and He said to them, 'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. And if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.'" So Jesus, He gives His disciples peace to overcome their fears, but then He stands before them, He's standing before them as evidence that the war has been won and they can therefore have peace. But then He reminds them that even though the war has been won, this doesn't mean that the battle... Battle has just begun, that the mission wasn't over. The mission hadn't failed. The mission didn't fail when Jesus Christ died on the cross. To the contrary, the mission was just getting started. That all of their hard work, all of their sacrifice, none of that had been in vain. But now the training wheels were coming off. And Jesus was saying, "I'm going to send you out with a mission, with a purpose that yes, the work of the cross is finished, but the witness to the cross has just begun." Says, "I'm sending you with the greatest purpose, the greatest mission, the greatest task of telling the world the greatest news, the good news that Jesus is alive, that He is risen, He has overcome Satan, sin and death, and there is forgiveness in His name." And so here in these couple of versions, Jesus, He explains that mission. He gives us the what, He gives us the how, He gives us the why. He says, "Just as the Father sent me, I am sending you." To what? "To go, to be my disciples, to be my witnesses, to preach the gospel to the ends of the earth." That's the what of the mission. And then He tells them how. He says, "And I'm giving you my Holy Spirit. I'm giving you the power of the Holy Spirit, the power of the gospel. This is how you're going to go out and accomplish this mission." And then He tells them the why in verse 23. He says, "For if you forgive the sins of any there forgiven them, and if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld." What on earth is Jesus talking about here? Because if you know scripture, you know that scripture teaches us that only God has the authority to forgive sin. So Jesus, is He contradicting that here? Well, no, He's not. This is one of those rare places where we kind of do need to take a closer look at the Greek grammar. I don't like to be that like Greek geek type of pastor, but occasionally it's helpful to know, because when you look the phrasing in English, it is a little bit awkward. But grammatically what's happening here is that this phrase, "They are forgiven them." In the Greek, it's just one word and it's a perfect passive verb. It's indicating an event that has already taken place and yet is ongoing and continuing. So Jesus, He's not saying that we as His disciples have the authority to go and forgive sins. But He is saying that we do have the responsibility to go out and declare the forgiveness of sins, to declare that the world that the means by which our sins can be forgiven is to repent and to believe the gospel, that forgiveness comes only by grace alone, through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. We need to go to the world and tell them this good news. The apostle Paul does a really great job teaching about this in 2 Corinthians 5:17, he says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away and behold the new has come. And all of this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation." And he explains, "That is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and in entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore...", he says, "... We are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us, and we implore you on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God." And this is the message, "For our sake. He made Him, Jesus, to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God." Jesus is sending this out as his ambassadors with the message of reconciliation, not to forgive sins by our own authority, but to announce with authority, to announce with conviction and confidence that yes, all who repents and believe this good news will be saved. They have been forgiven. So He sends us with a peace that passes understanding, He sends us with a purpose that presses into eternity. Now, there's something else going on here as well. Throughout this passage, John is dropping these hints, he's dropping these clues and he wants us to pick up on a theme, that he is telling us the story of Jesus' resurrection, but he's doing it in a way where he kind of wants us to alert our minds, to draw our minds' attention to another story, a story that he kind of assumes that we're all familiar with. It's the story of creation in the Garden of Eden. So two times in this chapter, John pauses and he makes it a point to alert us, the reader, to know that all of these things, they happened on the first day of the week, on the first day of the week. Then we find when Jesus finds Mary Magdalene, He finds her in a garden. And actually she mistakes Him, she thinks that He is the gardener. And then here John tells us that after Jesus tells his disciples that He's sending them out, He does something really strange, He breathes on them and gives them His Holy Spirit. It's a weird detail, but what's happening is John is noticing the providential connections between these two stories, and he's trying to help us connect the dots so that we can see the bigger picture of what's going on here. If you remember Genesis 2:7, it says, "Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed." And the big idea, the picture that John wants us to see is that just as the opening chapters of Genesis tell us the story of creation, well a new chapter is opening with the resurrection of Christ, the beginnings of the story of new creation, that Jesus Christ is the first fruits of that creation. As we read earlier, Paul told us that, "And therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are also a new creation born again by the Holy Spirit." That just as Adam's sin brought a curse upon the world, Christ's righteousness is reversing that curse. It's undoing death. It is bringing a blessing to all who repent and believe. And that just as God breathed life into Adam and gave him his purpose, gave him his mission, Jesus Christ is breathing new life, eternal life into us as His disciples and sending us out with a mission as well to fill the earth with the glory of God by going and making disciples of all the nations. So again, practically, personally, what does this mean? This doesn't mean that every follower of Jesus needs to quit their job today and go be a missionary on the other side of the world somewhere. But it certainly does mean that every follower of Jesus Christ needs to live with this awareness, live with this mindset that we are living, walking every moment of our lives in the presence of God the Father, that we are living our lives abiding in the grace of God the Son, and we're living our lives by the power of God the Holy Spirit, so that we can assess, so that we can understand, so that we can know how we can be the most effective witnesses, the most useful servants to Christ that we can possibly be no matter where it is that He has called us to stand, in whatever location and whatever occupation and whatever vocation and whatever station of life He calls us to, we are to be His witnesses. And so at home, at church, at work, at school, in private, in public, and whatever you do and wherever you go, go with this mindset that the purpose of God is to be lived out in your words, in your worship, in your work, in your witness, that you are an ambassador for Christ. So Christ is risen, therefore, fear has been overcome by peace. Now Christ is risen, therefore, futility has been overcome by this great purpose. And then finally, we see Christ is risen, therefore, frustration has been overcome by passion. This is John 20:24. We see another interaction between Jesus and his disciples. We're told in verse 24 that, "Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, he was actually not there with them when Jesus came. And so the disciples, they told him, 'We have seen the Lord.' But he said to them, 'Unless I see in His hands the marks of the nails and place my finger into the marks of the nails and place my hand into His side, I will never believe.'" I think we're all familiar with Doubting Thomas, even if you never heard this story before, it's popular enough that we're most of us familiar with the idiom, right? We're familiar with the idea of a Doubting Thomas. Thomas has been immortalized for his doubts. But when I read this, I think there's something more going on there. He says, "Unless I touch those wounds for myself...", he says, "... I will never believe." Never is not a word often used by skeptics. Never is a word more often used by cynics. There seems to be an air of bitterness, of resentment, of frustration in his reply. "I put my heart out there. I trusted this man. I gave God my hopes and my dreams and look what it got me. My dreams have been shattered, my heart has been broken, and I don't know what's going on. You guys say Jesus is risen from the dead, but I'm never putting myself out there. I'm not going to trust. I'm not going to open my heart. I'm not going to allow my hopes to get up like that. I will never believe." These sound like the words that are coming from a cold and a hardened heart. And I'm sure that there are some people here today that have some honest doubts, and you just need to go and look at the evidence and find those answers. But I wonder if there are some here today who, like Thomas, it's not so much that you have honest doubts as much as it is you've got a hardened heart. It's not that you don't see the evidence, you really don't want to see the evidence. You don't want to believe. You're afraid to believe, afraid of what that might mean for all of this to be true. Because if Jesus Christ is risen, then Jesus Christ is Lord. And if Jesus Christ is Lord, then I need to submit my life to Him as Lord. And if I need to submit my life to Him as Lord, how do I know that I can trust Him? And I say that not to provoke anyone, not to anger, but I want to stoke in you a passion because, thankfully, this is not the end of Thomas' story, and it doesn't need to be the end of your story either. John goes on in verse 26, and he tells us that, "Eight days later, His disciples, again, they're inside again." And this time he says, "Thomas was with them. And although, again, the doors were locked, Jesus came again and He stood among them, and He again said to them, 'Peace be with you.' And then He said to Thomas, 'Put your finger here and see my hands, and put out your hand and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve but believe.' And Thomas answered him, 'My Lord and my God.' Jesus said to him, 'Have you believed because you've seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.'" I love this because Jesus, He comes again, He goes straight for Thomas this time, and He basically grants him his wish. He says, "Here I am, Thomas, you can put your hand in my wounds, feel my side. I'm putting this opportunity before you." But Thomas doesn't take it. We don't see him reaching for Christ. We see him falling at the feet, worshiping Christ, crying out, "My Lord and my God." What is going on here? Well, I think what's going on here is that Thomas, he thought that he wanted proof that Jesus was alive and what he really needed even more than that was proof that he himself was loved, and he saw that proof. It was etched in the hands and the feet. It was carved in the side of the risen Jesus Christ. He saw and he understood, his hard heart was melted as it put the pieces together that those scars proved to Thomas that yes, this man standing before him really was Jesus. And yes, this proved to him that Jesus really was God, and also proved to him that God really was good, that he could trust him with his heart because this is the man, that was my cross that Jesus bore. That those are our scars that Jesus continues to bear, not just for Thomas, for all of us, for all of eternity, so that we can all have this great reminder of how we have been loved. That the passion of Jesus Christ, this is the only thing that can take a cold, hard, cynical heart and replace our doubts, replace our frustrations with passion and with joy. Have you ever wondered what became of Doubting Thomas? Because you read the New Testament and New Testament tells us a lot about Paul, tells a lot about like Peter and James and John, it doesn't really tell us that much more about Thomas. And what we know is that Thomas not only became a passionate worshiper of Christ that day, he actually became a passionate missionary for Christ for the rest of his life. That after this, history tells us that Thomas took the good news 3000 miles to the East, and for the rest of his life, he spent his days preaching the gospel, planting churches and ministering to the people of India until eventually he was martyred for his faith around 70 AD. There are actually somewhere between 25-30 million Christians living in India today, and many of them, most of them, trace their heritage all the way back to good old Doubting Thomas. I actually learned after our first service this morning that we have a sister in the church, a member of Mosaic whose family came from India, and she says, "Our family, we have been Christians from the first century because of Thomas. Because of Doubting Thomas, we are here and we've persisted throughout the ages as followers of Jesus Christ." Thomas may be immortalized right now for his doubts, but he's going to be remembered throughout all of eternity for his great passion and faith. Thomas saw, he believed and he did something about it, right? He had this great passion for Jesus Christ. And because of that, millions of people since have been blessed that. Jesus says, "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe." And how many people have believed, not because they saw the risen Christ, but because of Thomas, because of his witness, because of his faithful testimony to Jesus Christ? When you truly experience the power and the love of the risen Christ, you will have peace. You will have purpose, but you should also have this passion and you should grow in this passion, a passion to worship God, to worship Christ for all that He is, and a passion to go and to tell the world of all that He has done. And if you're here today and you're like, "Yeah, I don't have that. I don't have that passion." Well, I would encourage you to look, to meditate, to fix your eyes on the passion of the cross and the passion of Jesus Christ. These are not things that we can muster up from within ourselves. These are things that come as a result of looking, of considering, of understanding in the center of who we are what Christ has done for us. That the risen Christ has only risen because He has first fallen. Because He first laid down His life that he loved us to such an extent that before rising from the dead, He first died in our place, that He took up the cross, He laid down His life, and then He rose in victory over Satan, sin and death so that we could be raised up with Him to stand with Him in victory over Satan sin and death as well. 1 Corinthians 15:54, the apostle Paul tells us, "When the perishable puts on the imperishable and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written. Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord, your labor is not in vain." If you're here today and you're not a Christian, you don't consider yourself a follower of Jesus Christ, or you're new to Christianity, I just want to say we are so glad that you made the decision to be here with us this morning. We really are glad that you are here. And after the service today, Pastor Andy and myself are going to be right up here after the service, and we would love to answer any questions that you might have about Jesus, about the gospel, about Christianity, even if you want to just come up, introduce yourself and say hi. We would love to meet you. But our greatest desire, my greatest hope, I want every single person, every single soul in this room to experience the peace and the purpose of a life that has been submitted to Christ Jesus, to grow in their passion for Christ and His kingdom as they grow to know and to experience God's passion for them, that He gave, that He poured out through His son Jesus Christ. So you're welcome. We invite you, come talk to us after the service, talk to people around you. Talk to people at the welcome center. There's people here that would love to meet you and get to know you and talk to you today. But right now, speaking of passion, we have an opportunity to express that passion as we continue and sing together right now. So it's Easter Sunday. I hope you're ready. I hope you're excited. I am ready to celebrate with you. So as the band comes up, I am going to pray and we are going to spend some time just celebrating, worshiping, praising our risen Lord together. Let's pray. Father, your word tells us that if Christ has not been raised, well then our preaching is in vain and our faith is in vain. But in fact, Christ has been raised and this changes everything. We praise you. We thank you for this. God, give us clean hands. We pray that you open our eyes and soften our hearts and remind us again of your power, of your goodness, of your beauty. May all that you are and all that you have done right now in this moment, captivate our minds and our hearts, and stir our affections, our passion to give you the praise and the glory that you deserve. And we thank you that we can just sing to you now. We do so in the name of Jesus Christ, our risen Lord and Savior. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Christ Is Risen

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 9, 2023 40:30


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com Before we begin, first of all, everyone looks great. Elephant in the room, I'm wearing a suit. I told my brother Chidi before our service, "There's only three ways you're going to see this. Someone needs to get married, someone needs to die, or someone needs to rise from the dead." And praise God, we get to celebrate all three. That Jesus Christ came, He lived, He died, He rose from the dead, He is coming again to take His bride home to eternity, to the wedding supper of the lamb. We look forward to that. And before we begin today, there's something we got to do. If you've been around Mosaic for a while, you know what's coming. Hopefully you got warmed up on your way to church this morning. And we're going to do a little bit of a call and response. And so if you're new to Mosaic, if this is your first time here, what we're going to do is I'm going to say, "He is risen." And then we're all going to say together, "He is risen indeed." We're going to do that three times, each time with more emphatically, as loud as you want. So is everybody ready? All right, Here we go. He is risen. He is risen indeed.He is risen.He is risen indeed.He is risen.He is risen indeed. Praise God. Jesus is alive. He is risen. He is reigning. He is seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven. He's coming again to judge the living and the dead. These are the facts of the matter. This is the truth of the matter. And the question that I want to put before us this morning, however, is if this is the truth of the matter, why does it matter? What does it mean? What are the implications of such a thing? How does a man rising from the dead 2,000 years ago impact us today? And if you go to our website, we probably have at least a dozen sermons out there archived on our website that look at the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The evidence is there. And if that's not something that you've examined, if that's something in you're interested in, I would encourage you to go and to examine the evidence. There are so many resources out there that look at that and that prove the veracity of Christianity, that Jesus Christ really did rise from the dead. But the question is why does it matter? And it matters because if this is just a nice story, a fable, a myth, a legend for children, if Jesus was just a nice guy who did some nice things, He died and that was it, then the reality is that really nothing in life matters. Not in any objective sense. That ultimately life is meaningless and that ultimately death is coming and it's going to have the last laugh. But if Christ is risen, well then that changes everything. Because if Christ is risen, then everything matters. Your life matters, my life matters, our lives matter. Our choices matter. Every moment that we have matters. It's loaded with potential that could send ripples throughout all of eternity. It matters. So if you have your Bibles, we're going to be in the Gospel of John today. If you turn to the New Testament, it's Matthew, Mark, Luke, and then John. We're going to be in John chapter 20. And this chapter, it tells us about a couple of interactions that took place between Jesus and His disciples on that first Easter Sunday. And as we look at the story, we're going to see just the life changing difference that His resurrection made for them on that day and the life changing difference that it continues to make for us on this day and every day. And so here in a moment, I'm going to read a couple verses from John chapter 20 to get us started. But before we do, before we get into our text today, I want us to all try to get into the disciples' shoes today, to put ourselves in their place, to get in the mindset that they were in. That for the last three years of our lives, we have been following our rabbi Jesus all over the place, wherever He goes. And during this time, we have learned the truth and the wisdom of His profound teaching. We have observed the integrity and the purity of His life and His character. And we've seen Him do things that we thought were impossible. He's walked on water, He's healed the sick. He has given sight to the blind. A couple of weeks ago, we even saw Him raise a man from the dead. And all of this, for the past three years, this has been our lives all kind of leading up to the zenith, to pinnacle that we reached just one week ago as we walked with this man into the city of Jerusalem. And as we did, He's greeted by crowds of people from all over the world, shouting, "Hosanna." And waving palm branches that at last their great expectations have come to fruition. That this is the king. This is the one we've been waiting for. This is the Messiah, God's chosen one who has come to save His people. We began our week just a few days ago with the euphoria of Palm Sunday of the triumphal entry. And as we walked into the city of Jerusalem that day, a whole new world of possibilities opened up before our very eyes. We began our week with that elation only to end our week with the horrors of Good Friday, to have that door slammed violently back into our face. And we watched helplessly as our teacher, our friend, our king, our hope for the world was betrayed, arrested, falsely accused, viciously beaten, mocked, flogged and crucified, nailed to a cross. We watched as they sealed His cold dead body into a cold, dark grave. And you try to imagine the spectrum of emotions that we would be feeling right now as His disciples. Your best friend is dead. More than that, your Messiah is dead. With Him, the mission is dead. Our purpose in life is dead. Our hope for the world, our hope for the future is dead. And realistically, you're probably beginning to wonder about this time, "How long is it before the rest of us are dead as well?" And I say all this because as we turn to our text and read about that first Easter Sunday, we don't find the disciples all nice sharply dressed, excited, ready to go out for a nice Easter brunch. We find them sleepless, anxious, nauseated, and terrified. We find them with bloodshot eyes and with garments that have been stained with tears. We find them hiding in a cold, dark room behind a closed locked door. And John tells us in his gospel that they were hiding and they were afraid. Afraid for their lives, afraid that all had been lost, afraid that their mission had failed, afraid that after everything that they had been through that nothing really changed. And then Jesus Christ steps into the room and they realize nothing is ever going to be the same. Jesus was alive. And that this changes everything.So if you have your Bibles, we're going to work our way through John chapter 20. And I'm going to begin just by reading a couple of verses from the middle of the chapter. John 20:19&20. The Apostle John tells us that, "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked were the disciples were for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and He stood among them and He said to them, 'Peace be with you.' And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord." Now the first change, the first difference that we see from this encounter with Jesus, that Christ is risen, therefore fear has been overcome by peace. That Jesus stepped out of the tomb of His death and into the room, into the tomb of their anxiety. And in doing so, He lands a death blow to all of their fears, that He stands there before them as the ultimate undeniable proof that nothing in this life, not even crucifixion, not even death itself, could put an end to the mission, could put an end to God's plan of salvation. See, we need to understand that when Jesus died, the disciples, all their hopes and dreams died with Him. They were shattered, dashed to the ground, pounded into dust, burned into ashes, blown away by the wind. They were gone, hopeless. The problem is not that the disciples had set their hopes too high, it's actually that up until this point, they had been setting their hopes way too low, that they were hoping for a messiah who could come and maybe help them escape their problems, help them to escape their enemies. Jesus hadn't come for that. Jesus did not come to merely escape death. He came to face it head on, to experience it and to defeat it. He had not come to overthrow the feeble Roman Empire. He had come to overthrow the dominion of darkness, to rise in victory over Satan, sin and death. And in doing so, to declare to the world, to offer to the world terms of peace, to a world that was ravaged by war, ravaged by sin. So when Jesus tells His disciples, "Peace be with you.", He's not promising them that their problems are all just going to immediately disappear and go away. But He is promising them that despite all of these problems, that despite all of their trials, all the tribulations, all the persecutions that they face, that they would ultimately overcome. Apostle Paul in writing about these things in Romans 8:31, he says, "Therefore, what shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It's God who justifies us. Who is to condemn us? Christ Jesus is the one who died, more than that, who is raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" And he says, "Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or swords?" He says, "As it's written for your sake, we are being killed all the day long. We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. No, in all of these things, we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. "For...", he says, "... I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God. In Christ Jesus, our Lord." Jesus is alive. And this doesn't mean that the battle is over, but it does certainly mean that the war has been won. So as we fight this good fight of faith, we can do so with peace, with hope, with joy. We can do so knowing, as Paul tells us in just a few chapters later in Romans 16:20, that, "The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet." And this is the heart of the matter, that the true peace that we need, it is not just peace with the superficial circumstances of our life, the true peace we need more than anything else, it is peace with God and everything else is rooted in that peace. It's the peace of knowing that we have been forgiven, that we have been justified by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, and therefore no weapon formed against us can prosper. No accusation of the enemy brought against us can stand because Jesus Christ on His throne at the right hand of the Father interceding for us. So there's nothing we need to fear in this life. There's nothing that we need to fear and death because nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Now Paul says in Romans 5:1, he says, "Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we also obtain access by faith into this grace in which we stand and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God." Verse three says, "Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces, that it is not vain. It is doing something productive. Suffering produces endurance." And he says, "Endurance produces character and character produces hope. And hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through His Holy Spirit who's been given to us." So therefore, if we are to face this battle, we do so knowing that our king is with us, that He loves us, and that He is leading us to certain victory. And even if we are to fall in this battle, we do so knowing that our king has gone before us, He has defeated death and He now holds the keys to eternal life. And so let's take that from up here and let's bring that down to earth like practically and personally. How peaceful is your life right now? The peace that we're talking about is objectively true for all who have been born again through faith in Jesus Christ. But are you experiencing it? Are you living in it day today? Well, a few verses earlier in John chapter 20, we read about another encounter that Jesus had with another one of his disciples, his disciple, Mary Magdalene, that early that morning she had gone to the tomb and she gets there and she finds it empty. And as we see her in verse 11, we're told that, "Mary stood there weeping outside of the tomb, and as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. And they said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping?' And when she said to them, 'Well, they've taken away my Lord and I don't know where they've laid Him.' And having said this, she turned around and she saw Jesus standing, but she did not know it was Jesus. "Jesus said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?' And supposing Him to be the gardener, she said to Him, 'Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you've laid Him and I will go and I will take Him away.' And Jesus said to her, 'Mary.' And she turned and said to Him in Aramaic, 'Rabboni.', which means teacher. And Jesus her, 'Do not clinging to me for I've not yet ascended to the Father, but go to my brothers and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and to your Father, to my God and your God.'" Mary Magdalene went and she announced this good news to the disciples. This is a pretty familiar story that you often hear on Easter Sunday and it's a familiar story. But the question that I want us to ask ourselves, the question I want you to ask yourself this morning is we see two very different Marys in this passage from beginning to end, one who is stricken with anxiety, with fear, and one who is overcome with peace and with joy. And are you more like the Mary that we see anxious and distraught, weeping at the tomb of your shattered hopes? Or are you more like the Mary that we see weeping tears of joy worshiping at the feet of her risen savior, her living hope? Because a lack of peace, well it comes from a misplaced hope. You're building on a shaky foundation. And that's what Mary really, she'd come to that tomb and her hopes had been shattered and she needed to find a better hope. She needed to find a living hope that she had hoped for a savior that could avoid death. Well, she needed a savior that could defeat death. Because Mary, her biggest problem was that she didn't so much need to be saved from her enemies nearly as much as she needed to be saved from herself, saved from her sin. And the only way that Jesus could do that for her was by laying down His life, going to the cross and first dying in her place so then therefore He could rise in victory over Satan, sin and death to offer her this peace. And Jesus offers us peace. If you're not experiencing this in your life right now, however, well, I think Jesus would ask us the same thing He asked Mary, "Why? Why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?" If you're anxious, if you are afraid, perhaps you've been building your hope on a shaky foundation. Perhaps you've been looking for the wrong things in the wrong places. You've been looking for maybe a Jesus that could save you from your circumstances, where what you need more than anything else is a Jesus who can come and save you from yourself, from your pride, from your self-righteousness, from your self-reliance, from the sin that separates us from our father, that that places this wedge, that drives this chasm between us and God. Because Jesus Christ is the king of kings. He is the Lord of lords. Jesus is the Prince of Peace objectively, but you're only going to experience that peace personally when He is seated in his proper place, not on a throne in Jerusalem, but on the throne of your heart. In Colossians 3:15, Paul says, "Therefore, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful." Paul says again in the book of Philippians, "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God." In verse seven, he says, "And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." So the first thing that we see is that Christ has risen, therefore fear can be overcome by peace. Now the second point we see is that Christ is risen, therefore futility has been overcome by purpose. So picking up again in John 20:19 it says, "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and He stood among them and He said to them, 'Peace be with you.' And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side, and the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord." In verse 21, "Jesus said to them again, 'Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me even so I am sending you.' And when He had said this, He breathed on them and He said to them, 'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. And if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.'" So Jesus, He gives His disciples peace to overcome their fears, but then He stands before them, He's standing before them as evidence that the war has been won and they can therefore have peace. But then He reminds them that even though the war has been won, this doesn't mean that the battle... Battle has just begun, that the mission wasn't over. The mission hadn't failed. The mission didn't fail when Jesus Christ died on the cross. To the contrary, the mission was just getting started. That all of their hard work, all of their sacrifice, none of that had been in vain. But now the training wheels were coming off. And Jesus was saying, "I'm going to send you out with a mission, with a purpose that yes, the work of the cross is finished, but the witness to the cross has just begun." Says, "I'm sending you with the greatest purpose, the greatest mission, the greatest task of telling the world the greatest news, the good news that Jesus is alive, that He is risen, He has overcome Satan, sin and death, and there is forgiveness in His name." And so here in these couple of versions, Jesus, He explains that mission. He gives us the what, He gives us the how, He gives us the why. He says, "Just as the Father sent me, I am sending you." To what? "To go, to be my disciples, to be my witnesses, to preach the gospel to the ends of the earth." That's the what of the mission. And then He tells them how. He says, "And I'm giving you my Holy Spirit. I'm giving you the power of the Holy Spirit, the power of the gospel. This is how you're going to go out and accomplish this mission." And then He tells them the why in verse 23. He says, "For if you forgive the sins of any there forgiven them, and if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld." What on earth is Jesus talking about here? Because if you know scripture, you know that scripture teaches us that only God has the authority to forgive sin. So Jesus, is He contradicting that here? Well, no, He's not. This is one of those rare places where we kind of do need to take a closer look at the Greek grammar. I don't like to be that like Greek geek type of pastor, but occasionally it's helpful to know, because when you look the phrasing in English, it is a little bit awkward. But grammatically what's happening here is that this phrase, "They are forgiven them." In the Greek, it's just one word and it's a perfect passive verb. It's indicating an event that has already taken place and yet is ongoing and continuing. So Jesus, He's not saying that we as His disciples have the authority to go and forgive sins. But He is saying that we do have the responsibility to go out and declare the forgiveness of sins, to declare that the world that the means by which our sins can be forgiven is to repent and to believe the gospel, that forgiveness comes only by grace alone, through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. We need to go to the world and tell them this good news. The apostle Paul does a really great job teaching about this in 2 Corinthians 5:17, he says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away and behold the new has come. And all of this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation." And he explains, "That is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and in entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore...", he says, "... We are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us, and we implore you on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God." And this is the message, "For our sake. He made Him, Jesus, to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God." Jesus is sending this out as his ambassadors with the message of reconciliation, not to forgive sins by our own authority, but to announce with authority, to announce with conviction and confidence that yes, all who repents and believe this good news will be saved. They have been forgiven. So He sends us with a peace that passes understanding, He sends us with a purpose that presses into eternity. Now, there's something else going on here as well. Throughout this passage, John is dropping these hints, he's dropping these clues and he wants us to pick up on a theme, that he is telling us the story of Jesus' resurrection, but he's doing it in a way where he kind of wants us to alert our minds, to draw our minds' attention to another story, a story that he kind of assumes that we're all familiar with. It's the story of creation in the Garden of Eden. So two times in this chapter, John pauses and he makes it a point to alert us, the reader, to know that all of these things, they happened on the first day of the week, on the first day of the week. Then we find when Jesus finds Mary Magdalene, He finds her in a garden. And actually she mistakes Him, she thinks that He is the gardener. And then here John tells us that after Jesus tells his disciples that He's sending them out, He does something really strange, He breathes on them and gives them His Holy Spirit. It's a weird detail, but what's happening is John is noticing the providential connections between these two stories, and he's trying to help us connect the dots so that we can see the bigger picture of what's going on here. If you remember Genesis 2:7, it says, "Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed." And the big idea, the picture that John wants us to see is that just as the opening chapters of Genesis tell us the story of creation, well a new chapter is opening with the resurrection of Christ, the beginnings of the story of new creation, that Jesus Christ is the first fruits of that creation. As we read earlier, Paul told us that, "And therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are also a new creation born again by the Holy Spirit." That just as Adam's sin brought a curse upon the world, Christ's righteousness is reversing that curse. It's undoing death. It is bringing a blessing to all who repent and believe. And that just as God breathed life into Adam and gave him his purpose, gave him his mission, Jesus Christ is breathing new life, eternal life into us as His disciples and sending us out with a mission as well to fill the earth with the glory of God by going and making disciples of all the nations. So again, practically, personally, what does this mean? This doesn't mean that every follower of Jesus needs to quit their job today and go be a missionary on the other side of the world somewhere. But it certainly does mean that every follower of Jesus Christ needs to live with this awareness, live with this mindset that we are living, walking every moment of our lives in the presence of God the Father, that we are living our lives abiding in the grace of God the Son, and we're living our lives by the power of God the Holy Spirit, so that we can assess, so that we can understand, so that we can know how we can be the most effective witnesses, the most useful servants to Christ that we can possibly be no matter where it is that He has called us to stand, in whatever location and whatever occupation and whatever vocation and whatever station of life He calls us to, we are to be His witnesses. And so at home, at church, at work, at school, in private, in public, and whatever you do and wherever you go, go with this mindset that the purpose of God is to be lived out in your words, in your worship, in your work, in your witness, that you are an ambassador for Christ. So Christ is risen, therefore, fear has been overcome by peace. Now Christ is risen, therefore, futility has been overcome by this great purpose. And then finally, we see Christ is risen, therefore, frustration has been overcome by passion. This is John 20:24. We see another interaction between Jesus and his disciples. We're told in verse 24 that, "Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, he was actually not there with them when Jesus came. And so the disciples, they told him, 'We have seen the Lord.' But he said to them, 'Unless I see in His hands the marks of the nails and place my finger into the marks of the nails and place my hand into His side, I will never believe.'" I think we're all familiar with Doubting Thomas, even if you never heard this story before, it's popular enough that we're most of us familiar with the idiom, right? We're familiar with the idea of a Doubting Thomas. Thomas has been immortalized for his doubts. But when I read this, I think there's something more going on there. He says, "Unless I touch those wounds for myself...", he says, "... I will never believe." Never is not a word often used by skeptics. Never is a word more often used by cynics. There seems to be an air of bitterness, of resentment, of frustration in his reply. "I put my heart out there. I trusted this man. I gave God my hopes and my dreams and look what it got me. My dreams have been shattered, my heart has been broken, and I don't know what's going on. You guys say Jesus is risen from the dead, but I'm never putting myself out there. I'm not going to trust. I'm not going to open my heart. I'm not going to allow my hopes to get up like that. I will never believe." These sound like the words that are coming from a cold and a hardened heart. And I'm sure that there are some people here today that have some honest doubts, and you just need to go and look at the evidence and find those answers. But I wonder if there are some here today who, like Thomas, it's not so much that you have honest doubts as much as it is you've got a hardened heart. It's not that you don't see the evidence, you really don't want to see the evidence. You don't want to believe. You're afraid to believe, afraid of what that might mean for all of this to be true. Because if Jesus Christ is risen, then Jesus Christ is Lord. And if Jesus Christ is Lord, then I need to submit my life to Him as Lord. And if I need to submit my life to Him as Lord, how do I know that I can trust Him? And I say that not to provoke anyone, not to anger, but I want to stoke in you a passion because, thankfully, this is not the end of Thomas' story, and it doesn't need to be the end of your story either. John goes on in verse 26, and he tells us that, "Eight days later, His disciples, again, they're inside again." And this time he says, "Thomas was with them. And although, again, the doors were locked, Jesus came again and He stood among them, and He again said to them, 'Peace be with you.' And then He said to Thomas, 'Put your finger here and see my hands, and put out your hand and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve but believe.' And Thomas answered him, 'My Lord and my God.' Jesus said to him, 'Have you believed because you've seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.'" I love this because Jesus, He comes again, He goes straight for Thomas this time, and He basically grants him his wish. He says, "Here I am, Thomas, you can put your hand in my wounds, feel my side. I'm putting this opportunity before you." But Thomas doesn't take it. We don't see him reaching for Christ. We see him falling at the feet, worshiping Christ, crying out, "My Lord and my God." What is going on here? Well, I think what's going on here is that Thomas, he thought that he wanted proof that Jesus was alive and what he really needed even more than that was proof that he himself was loved, and he saw that proof. It was etched in the hands and the feet. It was carved in the side of the risen Jesus Christ. He saw and he understood, his hard heart was melted as it put the pieces together that those scars proved to Thomas that yes, this man standing before him really was Jesus. And yes, this proved to him that Jesus really was God, and also proved to him that God really was good, that he could trust him with his heart because this is the man, that was my cross that Jesus bore. That those are our scars that Jesus continues to bear, not just for Thomas, for all of us, for all of eternity, so that we can all have this great reminder of how we have been loved. That the passion of Jesus Christ, this is the only thing that can take a cold, hard, cynical heart and replace our doubts, replace our frustrations with passion and with joy. Have you ever wondered what became of Doubting Thomas? Because you read the New Testament and New Testament tells us a lot about Paul, tells a lot about like Peter and James and John, it doesn't really tell us that much more about Thomas. And what we know is that Thomas not only became a passionate worshiper of Christ that day, he actually became a passionate missionary for Christ for the rest of his life. That after this, history tells us that Thomas took the good news 3000 miles to the East, and for the rest of his life, he spent his days preaching the gospel, planting churches and ministering to the people of India until eventually he was martyred for his faith around 70 AD. There are actually somewhere between 25-30 million Christians living in India today, and many of them, most of them, trace their heritage all the way back to good old Doubting Thomas. I actually learned after our first service this morning that we have a sister in the church, a member of Mosaic whose family came from India, and she says, "Our family, we have been Christians from the first century because of Thomas. Because of Doubting Thomas, we are here and we've persisted throughout the ages as followers of Jesus Christ." Thomas may be immortalized right now for his doubts, but he's going to be remembered throughout all of eternity for his great passion and faith. Thomas saw, he believed and he did something about it, right? He had this great passion for Jesus Christ. And because of that, millions of people since have been blessed that. Jesus says, "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe." And how many people have believed, not because they saw the risen Christ, but because of Thomas, because of his witness, because of his faithful testimony to Jesus Christ? When you truly experience the power and the love of the risen Christ, you will have peace. You will have purpose, but you should also have this passion and you should grow in this passion, a passion to worship God, to worship Christ for all that He is, and a passion to go and to tell the world of all that He has done. And if you're here today and you're like, "Yeah, I don't have that. I don't have that passion." Well, I would encourage you to look, to meditate, to fix your eyes on the passion of the cross and the passion of Jesus Christ. These are not things that we can muster up from within ourselves. These are things that come as a result of looking, of considering, of understanding in the center of who we are what Christ has done for us. That the risen Christ has only risen because He has first fallen. Because He first laid down His life that he loved us to such an extent that before rising from the dead, He first died in our place, that He took up the cross, He laid down His life, and then He rose in victory over Satan, sin and death so that we could be raised up with Him to stand with Him in victory over Satan sin and death as well. 1 Corinthians 15:54, the apostle Paul tells us, "When the perishable puts on the imperishable and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written. Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord, your labor is not in vain." If you're here today and you're not a Christian, you don't consider yourself a follower of Jesus Christ, or you're new to Christianity, I just want to say we are so glad that you made the decision to be here with us this morning. We really are glad that you are here. And after the service today, Pastor Andy and myself are going to be right up here after the service, and we would love to answer any questions that you might have about Jesus, about the gospel, about Christianity, even if you want to just come up, introduce yourself and say hi. We would love to meet you. But our greatest desire, my greatest hope, I want every single person, every single soul in this room to experience the peace and the purpose of a life that has been submitted to Christ Jesus, to grow in their passion for Christ and His kingdom as they grow to know and to experience God's passion for them, that He gave, that He poured out through His son Jesus Christ. So you're welcome. We invite you, come talk to us after the service, talk to people around you. Talk to people at the welcome center. There's people here that would love to meet you and get to know you and talk to you today. But right now, speaking of passion, we have an opportunity to express that passion as we continue and sing together right now. So it's Easter Sunday. I hope you're ready. I hope you're excited. I am ready to celebrate with you. So as the band comes up, I am going to pray and we are going to spend some time just celebrating, worshiping, praising our risen Lord together. Let's pray. Father, your word tells us that if Christ has not been raised, well then our preaching is in vain and our faith is in vain. But in fact, Christ has been raised and this changes everything. We praise you. We thank you for this. God, give us clean hands. We pray that you open our eyes and soften our hearts and remind us again of your power, of your goodness, of your beauty. May all that you are and all that you have done right now in this moment, captivate our minds and our hearts, and stir our affections, our passion to give you the praise and the glory that you deserve. And we thank you that we can just sing to you now. We do so in the name of Jesus Christ, our risen Lord and Savior. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
To God be the Glory

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 7, 2023 47:15


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Well, good evening. My name is Andy. I'm one of the pastors here at Mosaic along with Pastor Jan and Pastor Shane. And as we say every service, we are glad to have everybody here worshiping with us today. And whether you're new or one of our seasoned attendees, we're thankful to be worshiping with you. If you are not a regular attendee, we invite you out to come on Sunday after this service. We won't hold any announcements at the end of the service today. Come out, we have services at 9:15 and 11:15 AM. Bring friends, bring family, and just come celebrate the resurrection, as tonight we'll be a little more intense. But we're glad that you're here and we're always praying for the Lord to send us people asking questions about Christianity, asking questions about the cross of Jesus Christ. And praying that the Lord would also send seasoned saints to come and just take up the labor, the mission here with us in Boston. Tonight, I'm going to have just a meditation on God's zeal for His glory, how good Friday shows God's zeal for His glory. And before we do so, I just want to jump in and pray. Heavenly Father, we praise You that You are God. You are worthy of our worship. You speak to us through Your creation. When we look upon all that is good in this world, we see Your fingerprint upon it. When we look upon other human lives, we see Your presence. We see some of the character attributes that You have passed on. Lord, when we look upon Your word, most importantly, we see Your love for us. We see this Bible from the third chapter through the finish, talking about man's fall to sin and Your plan to be the solution to that, to crush the serpent on the head, and to come and be both the priest and the sacrifice of the atonement for our sins. And Lord, we praise You for sending Jesus Christ who is our brother, but is also our God. We thank You that He took on flesh to be tempted and tried in every way. He took on flesh to know the challenges firsthand that we face in this life. And Lord, He took on flesh to walk perfectly under your law in the way that we could not. And we thank you Lord that He came, He lived for the primary purpose of going to the cross for Your lost children. And He went and He bore the full wrath that is due for all of our sins and the work is finished. We praise You that as we look upon Good Friday, as we look upon Christ, we know that it is finished. And Lord, it's sad, it sickens us to know what Christ went through us. But we praise You for that. We praise You that we can say ultimately You have worked the great travesty of the cross for Your good, for Your glory, for our salvation. We pray right now. Lord, just show us more of Your heart. Let us not get lost in thinking what this day means and offers to us. Let's not just seek an emotional religious experience, Lord. Let us grow further and further in love with your heart. I pray these things in Jesus's name. Amen. Now to start, I want to read from Matthew ... Excuse me, Mark chapter 15 and I'll read the whole chapter, I think it's 1-47, Mark chapter 15 verses 1-47. "And as soon as it was morning, the chief priest held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council. And they bound Jesus and led him away and delivered him over to Pilate. And Pilate asked him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?' And he answered him, 'You have said so.' And the chief priest accused him of many things. And Pilate again asked him, 'Have you no answer to make? See how many charges they bring against you?' But Jesus made no further answer, so that Pilate was amazed. Now at the feast he used to release for them one prisoner for whom they asked. And among the rebels in prison, who had committed murder in the insurrection, there was a man called Barabbas. And the crowd came up and began to ask Pilate to do as he usually did for them. And he answered them saying, 'Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?' For he perceived that it was out of envy that the chief priest had delivered him up. But the chief priest stirred up the crowd to have him release for them Barabbas instead. And Pilate again said to them, 'Then what shall I do with the man you call the King of the Jews?' And they cried out again, 'Crucify him.' And Pilate said to them, 'Why? What evil has he done?' But they shouted all the more, 'Crucify him.' So Pilate wishing to satisfy the crowd, released for them Barabbas. And having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor's headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. And they clothed him a in a purple cloak and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. And they began to salute him, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him. And they comp compelled a passerby, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry the cross. And they brought him to the place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull). And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take. And it was the third hour when they crucified him. And the inscription of the charge against him read, 'The King of the Jews.' And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, 'Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself and come down from the cross!' So also the chief priest with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, 'He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the King of Israel come down now from the cross that we may see and believe.' Those who were crucified with him also reviled him. And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, 'Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?' 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' And some of the bystanders hearing it said, 'Behold, he is calling Elijah.' And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink and said, 'Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down.' And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, "Truly this man was the Son of God!' There were also women looking on from a distance among whom were Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James and the younger and of Joses and Salome. When he was in Galilee, they followed him and ministered to him, and there were also many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem." "And when evening had come, since it was the day of preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate was surprised to hear that he should have already died. And summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he was already dead. And when he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the corpse to Joseph. And Joseph brought a linen shroud, and taking him down, wrapped him in the linen shroud and laid him in a tomb that had been cut out of the rock. And he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw where he was laid." This is the reading of God's holy word. It's in this, the blood of Christ, His crucifixion, and on Sunday, his resurrection that we boast as Christians. To start, I'm glad that Caleb in the introduction said Happy Good Friday because it's just a confusing day. This is the most solemn day of the year for the church, yet it really is one of the most joyful days. Today we celebrate the cross of Jesus Christ. And I come from a lot of ... I've been through a few traditions of Christianity before I came to Mosaic. And there's a lot of questions about how to approach Good Friday. And so I want to start by just making a couple critiques of the typical approach of Good Friday. There's one where people come and on Good Friday, there's this extra pressure to come and think about what Christ went through for me. Wow. Look how far, look at the ridicule, look at the mockery, look at the physical pain, look at the sin, the wrath that He bore for me. And I want to say keep doing that. We have to keep doing that for at the cross we boast He who knew us and became sin, so in Him we might become the righteousness of God. And there's a tendency though, to just get one side of the Good Friday story. And it's when you really just think about, wow, what did Jesus go through for me, what you miss out on is, is your heart being taken to worship of God. What does the cross, how does this direct me to worship of God? And so this point's a little confusing. I say, don't make this the only thing that you do. As you contemplate the weight that Christ bore on the cross, you should be in awe and astonishment and wonder about what He did for you. You should grimace as you read the gospel story, the crucifixion story. You should grimace as we take communion and you eat the bread and drink the juice, the wine. You should grimace, almost feel sick as I go through a reading to close out my portion of this message that will tell you and explain more details of the crucifixion than you could have ever wanted to know. But you don't want to make it the primary thing. And there's just beneath this wow what he did for me, some Christians can just get lost. We say that Jesus Christ, He is our Lord and He is our savior. And we get stuck in our faith just saying, "Wow, he's my savior. What has he done for me?" But beneath that is really me, me, me, instead of wow, God, God, God, look at what God has done. And so I challenge you today, think. I said this is a message where we're talking about God's zeal for his glory. As I preach to you right now, ask the Lord to show you what does Good Friday teach me about God Himself? Not what does Good Friday do for me? And so that's a nuanced point. You want to feel the weight. You should feel the weight. You have the law of God standing over you in this dark building right now. I just read Mark, the crucifixion story. You should be feeling it, but don't let that be the only thing. Don't let that be the primary thing. And next, I just want to critique. A lot of people come to a Good Friday service to tremble and really just get that little taste of religious experience, of emotional experience that will just carry them forward in their life. There's a famous hymn that really I think captures this tendency for Good Friday and it's, were you there when they crucified my Lord. I think a lot of people know that. And the lyrics go: Were you there when you crucified my Lord? Were you there when you crucified my Lord? Oh. If you know the song, you know that I do not have the capacity to sing it. Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble. And I used to attend a church that sang this song on every Good Friday and I really looked forward to it. It's catchy. Guys like Johnny Cash sang it. But I think this approach captures, reveals the wrong mindset. It reveals a mindset of I just want to tremble. I just want to be shaken a little bit as I engage God, as I engage His holy scriptures. And this has shown, some Christians who are regular church attendees, we fall into this. But many people come out once a year, let me go get my fix, let me go get right before God by doing this. And it's not the right way. What's the problem? We only want to sometimes tremble. We want to pause and be shaken a bit. And what Good Friday teaches is that it's not about us. It's not about coming to get a religious experience. And you can come and do that every week at Mosaic and hopefully it goes beyond that to your heart. But Good Friday, first and foremost is about God and His zeal for His glory. And if your mind, as you ponder just the weight that Christ bore for you, if you come and you have this religious experience, but you don't get taken up to worship and awe and wonder at the glory of God and his character, then we have failed in this service. You are either after the wrong thing in your approach or we as a church are not taking you to the heavenly of heavenlys, taking you into the presence of God. And Jesus knew this. He knew that the cross was all about God's glory. Right before He was betrayed by Judas and handed to the authorities Christ prayed, "Now is my soul troubled." And this is John chapter 12:27-28. "Now, is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.' Then a voice from heaven came from heaven: 'I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.'" When we observe Good Friday, we tend to get so caught up in the thinking about the power and ambiance of Christ, of the situation of the service. We get so caught up in thinking about what does this mean for me? What's the point of coming out here? How does this add to my personal walk in the faith? But in doing so, we miss what God is trying to teach us about himself. And what is that God has a zeal. He's teaching us, God, I have a zeal for my glory, first and foremost. What is Christ's passion? This week where we talk about his suffering in holy week, it's a storm, literally the sky went black, probably felt a lot like this for several hours of the day in Jerusalem, while Christ was on the cross. The cross is the storm. The fury of God's just rest, the whole cup of it for all sins, past, present, and future of his children. And our engagement in one of the events in Christ's life with a storm should teach us how to take lessons from this storm on the cross. Mark 4:36-41 says, "And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep in the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, 'Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?' And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, 'Peace! Be still!' And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, 'Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?' And they're filled with great fear and said to one another, 'Who then is this, that even the wind in the sea obey him?'" So what's the situation at the end of this storm scene? Imagine just being in a boat with waves just rocking over your head, the winds just loud howling in your ears, rain's coming down, thunder, lightning, and Jesus is there sleeping and he wakes up and he says, "Peace. Be still." The situation at the end is that the disciples are left more scared as they ponder the nature of Jesus than they were by the storm that was rocking them a moment ago. "Who is this man? Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him," they ask. And that's how our engagement with the storm of Good Friday should be when we think about God. We should ask, "Who is this God?" When we get a greater glimpse at the lens he goes to preserve his just, his righteous, his glorious nature, it should shake us to the core, not just give us a little tremble. It should inspire us to turn to get right with him through Christ immediately and should change us all together from the inside out. And this is in several parts of scripture. Where do I give this primarily tonight? Romans chapter 3:21-26. It says, "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus for all who believe. For there is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." I think these verses contain the most important paragraph on the atonement in the Bible, and that's not biblical. That's just my after me really digging into it in this season and in the past. What do these verses say? They say that beneath God's pursuit of our justification, our being made right before him and forgiveness, beneath our justification and forgiveness in sending to the cross was the pursuit of God to clear his own name. Verse 25 can be understood as "God put Christ forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins." The text tells us that until Christ sacrifice on the cross, God's righteousness is at stake. His name was in need of vindication. Why is that the case? Why did God face the problem of needing to give a public vindication of his righteousness? The answer it's provided in verse 25, "because in his divine forbearance, he had passed over former sins." Now what does that mean? It means that for millennia, God had been doing what Psalm 103 verse 10 says. "He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities." Think King David. He sends a man off to war to get killed so that he can marry his wife and the prophet Nathan tells him his sins are forgiven and David gets to continue to serve as king. There's no punishment in the kingdom, and he's not stricken dead. And that's offensive. Why is passing over of sin of forgiveness such a problem? Well, what is sin? Romans 3:23 says, "For all sin and fall short of the glory of God," or translated literally, "all of sinned and lacked the glory of God." Sin is related to glory and it's understood as a lacking or losing of it. When Adam sinned, he lost the glory that came with being a sinless image bearer of the trial of God. How did he lose his glory? He exchanged that glory which was inherent in his nature as an image bearer of God for something offered to him in the creation. All sin is a preference for the temporary pleasures of things found within the finite creation over the everlasting joy of eternal fellowship with the creator. Sin is a failing to love God's glory above everything else. Altogether sin might be understood as an effort to rob God of his glory, or that sin is a rebellion against God's glory. Therefore, the problem when God passes over sin is that God seems to condone the behavior of those who commit sin. He seems to be saying it is a matter of indifference that his glory is spurned. He seems to condone the low assessment of who He is, His righteousness, His worth from the sinner. Where the passing over of sin communicates that God's glory and His righteous governance are of little or no value to the sinner. But according to Romans, this is the most basic problem that God solved by the death on his son. Verse 25 and 26 say, "This, God's putting Christ his son forward to die was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time." So God, he could have settled accounts with man by not saving anybody and punishing all sinners with hell. This would've demonstrated that He does not condone our falling short of his glory or the belittling of His honor. But God did not will to condemn everyone like that. John 3:17 says, "God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him." This truth we know well. We know well that God is for us. We know that our salvation is God's goal in sending Jesus. But today I'm asking, do you know the foundation of God's rescue plan for his children? Do you know that there is a deeper goal in the father's sending of the son? Do you know that God's love for us depends on a deeper love, namely God's love for his own glory? Do you know that God's desire to save sinners rest on a deeper desire, namely God's desire to vindicate his righteousness? Do you realize that the accomplishment of our salvation does not center on us, but on God's zeal for his own glory? The big question of the cross is not can we be saved, but can Christ repair the glory of God for the people of God? And the resounding answer of the Bible is yes. Christ drank the full cup of God's wrath for the sins of his children, past, present, future when he went to the cross and first and foremost for God the Father, then for us. So this is why is it important to understand, meditate upon Good Friday. It shows us that the cross is the foremost display of God's love for sinners. Not because it demonstrates the value of sinners, but because it vindicates the value of God for sinners to enjoy. God's love for man does not consist in making man central, but in making Himself central to man. The cross doesn't direct man's attention to His own vindicated worth, but to God's vindicated righteousness. This is love, God pursuing His own glory because the only eternal happiness for man is happiness focused on the riches of God's glory. Psalm 16:11 says, "In your presence there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore." God's self-exaltation, it's loving because it preserves for us and offers to us the only fully satisfying object of desire in the universe, Himself, the all glorious, all righteous God. If God doesn't correct things, if God doesn't make sure that there is payment for sins, he is not worthy to be God. At the cross your view of God and His character and love of God and His character, they should expand. He destroys any formulations of a God that we could have contrived by our own personal preferences. He destroys any construction of God that could have been contrived by the primary ideals of our day, our culture, our country, our government. At the cross, you don't just tremble. Sometimes but are shaken to the core. Who is this God that chases after his own glory with such zeal? At the cross, you see that you're not the center of things. Your glory and joy are not at the center of life and history, but God and his glory and joy are. You see that you're just blessed that He even offers a chance to walk beside Him in life despite your sin through faith in Jesus Christ. At the cross you see most clearly on Good Friday that you are a mere creature made for worship of the good, holy, and wise God. At the cross you see that God is both just and the justifier. You cherish the fact that he has procured your salvation through the sending of the Son and the fact of His righteous character. At the cross you'll find that to be loved intimately is to be forgiven, cleansed and enabled to see and to feel the wonder that the Father has for himself and that Christ has for the Father and that the spirit has for them both. To close my speaking portion before we partake ... Oh, excuse me, what the cross is it's the Grand Canyon. God doesn't take us to Mount Washington, a cheap New England wannabe. Now the cross, God takes us to the Grand Canyon. He displays the full majesty of who he is. He shows a zeal for righteousness, holiness, perfection, all glories, preserves them and says, "Look upon me. Look upon how great I am. Look at how holy set apart from all other as I am and be holy before me, because that is what is best for you." And praise God, he doesn't say that to us in our sin without hope, for we know that without Jesus Christ, who was perfect, who was holy, while we are sinners, we can look to Christ and have peace with him. We can look to God and know that He in all of His glory and power and splendor, the might of His good hand is working towards us for all of eternity in Jesus. And so to close my portion before we partake in communion together, I want to read a really long excerpt that does spend a lot of time making me say, "Wow, look what God has done for me." But as you read it, I want you to test yourself. I want you to test yourself. When you look at the death, the crucifixion of Christ, do you look simply to be shaken, to tremble a little? Or as a reader, are you only thinking, "Wow, look at what God has done for me," and not go beyond that? Or are you brought to praise and wonder to see the lens that God goes to preserve his glorious and righteous character for your eternal satisfaction in him? I'm going to read a long section from Fleming Rutledge's book, The Crucifixion: Understanding the Death of Jesus Christ. "It is formidably difficult to understand the cross today in its original context after 2000 years in which it has been domesticated, romanticized, idealized, and misappropriated. Occasionally a modern interpreter struggling to find some correspondence that can be grasped by people today will compare the cross of Roman times to the American electric chair. This is an adequate analogy for a number of reasons as we shall see, but we can learn a few things from it. Imagine revering an electric chair. Imagine using it as the focal point in our churches, hanging small replicas around our necks, carrying it aloft in procession and bow bowing our heads as it passes. The absurdity of this scenario can readily be grasped, but other features in the comparison might help us. For instance, the electric chair when it was still used was almost always used for executing the lowest class of criminal and majority of them black with no powerful connections or other resources. Similarly, the Romans virtually never used the cross for executing people who had occupied high positions and never for Roman citizens. Another point of contact is the contradictory response of revulsion and attraction familiar to anyone who has ever slowed to look at a wreck on a highway. Even the most fastidious person when confronted by a photograph of an electric chair, let alone the real thing, will experience a disturbing fascination. There have always been people who specialize in coming to cheer and applaud executions when they took place, whether lynchings, hangings, or electrocutions. That is what undoubtedly happened on Calvary when Jesus was nailed to the cross and left there to die. Crowds of people then as now took pleasure in reviling the one who is being put to death. When they became bored with this pastime, they went safely home to their comforts and gave the victim no further thought. 'It is nothing to you, all you who passed by,' Lamentations 1:12. But there are very important differences. Electrocutions were at least theoretically supposed to be humane and quick, but crucifixion as a method of execution was specifically designed to intensify and prolong agony. In this sense, the cross was infinitely more dreadful than the electric chair, odious, though the chair was. Another difference is that the person to be electrocuted is permitted the dignity of a mask or a hood, presumably so that the privilege of the face noted by Susan Sontag would be protected. Most important of all, electrocutions took place indoors out of public view with only a few select people permitted to watch. Crucifixion, on the other hand, was supposed to be seen by as many people as possible. The basement resulting from public display was a chief feature of the method along with the prolonging of the agony. It was a form of advertisement or public announcement. 'This person is the scum of the earth, not fit to live, more an insect than a human being.' The crucified wretch was pinned up like a specimen. Crosses were not placed out in the open for convenience or sanitation, but for maximum public exposure. Crucifixion as a means of execution in the Roman Empire had its express purpose, the elimination of victims from consideration as members of the human race. It cannot be said too strongly that it was its function. It was meant to indicate to all who might be toying with subversive ideas that crucified persons were not of the same species as either the executioners or the spectators, and were therefore not only expendable, but also deserving of ritualized extermination. Therefore, the mocking and jeering that accompanied crucifixion were not only allowed, they're part of the spectacle and were programmed into it. In a sense, crucifixion was a form of entertainment. Everyone understood that the specific role of the passerby was to exacerbate the dehumanization and degradation of the person had thus been designated to be a spectacle. Crucifixion was cleverly designed, we might say diabolically designed, to be an almost theatrical enactment of the sadistic and inhumane impulses that lie within human beings. According to the Christian gospel, the Son of God voluntarily and purposefully absorbed all of that, drawing it into himself. Anyone seeking to interpret Jesus crucifixion must decide whether or not to include a clinical description. Since the New Testament writers are conspicuously silent about the physical details, it is legitimate to ask whether it is suitable or helpful to introduce them. On the other hand, people in New Testament times had all seen crucifixions and did not need a description. The evangelists and the other New Testament writers were able to assume a familiarity with the method that is unthinkable for us today. Most of us have never even come close to see anyone tortured to death. 'For this reason,' as Martin Hengel writes, 'reflection on the harsh reality of crucifixion and antiquity may help us to overcome the acute loss of reality, which is to be found so often present in theology and preaching.' The early theologian originally called Jesus death the utterly vile death on the cross. Cicero, the great Roman statesman and writer referred to the crucifixion as the supreme penalty, exceeding burning and decapitation and gruesomeness. Some rudimentary knowledge of what was taking place will help us to understand these terms. The first phase of a Roman execution was scourging. The lictors, Roman legionnaires assigned to this duty used a whip made of leather cords to which small pieces of metal or bone had been fastened. Paintings of the scouring of Jesus had always shown him with a loin cloth but in fact the victim would've been naked, tied to a post in a position to expose the back and buttocks to maximum effect. With the first strokes of the scourge, skin would be pulled away and subcutaneous tissue exposed. As the process continued, the lacerations would begin to tear into the underlying skeletal muscles. This would result not only in a great pain but also in appreciable blood loss. The idea was to weaken the victim to a state just short of collapse or death. It was common for taunting and ridicule to accompany the procedure. In the case of Jesus, the New Testament tells us that a crown of thorns, a purple robe and a mock scepter were added to intensify the mockery. The condition of a prisoner after scourging just prior to crucifixion would depend upon several things. Previous physical condition, the enthusiasm of the lictors and the extent of blood loss. In the case of Jesus, these things cannot be known. But the fact that he was apparently unable to carry the crossbar himself would indicate that he was probably in a severely weakened state and he may have been close to circulatory shock. Those being crucified were then paraded through the streets, exposing them to the full scorn of the population. When the procession reached the site of the crucifixion, the victims would see before them the heavy upright wooden post permanently in place to which the crossbar, sorry, they have the Latin terms, to which the crossbar would be joint. The person was to be crucified. The person to be crucified would be thrown down on his back, exacerbating the pain of the wounds from the scourging and introducing dirt into them. His hands would be tied or now to the crossbar. Nailing seams to have been preferred by the Romans. Ossuary finds have given us a clearer idea of how this was done. 2000 years of Christian iconography notwithstanding that nails were not driven into the palms which could not support the weight of a man's body, but into the wrists. The long stake of the cross was then hoisted onto the crossbar with the victim dependent from it, and the feet were tied or nailed. At this point, the process of crucifixion proper began. Victims of crucifixion lived on their crosses for periods varying from three or four hours or to three or four days. It has often been remarked that Jesus ordeal is relatively brief. Perhaps he was weakened by the scourging or had lost more blood than usual or suffered cardiac rupture. We cannot know. In any sense, it has been surmised that the major pathophysiological effect of crucifixion beyond the excruciating pain was a marked interference with normal respiration, particularly exhalation, passive exhalation, which we all do thousand of times a day without thinking about it, becomes impossible for a person hanging on a cross. The weight of a body hanging by its wrists would depress the muscles required for breathing out. Therefore, each exiled breath could only be achieved by a tremendous effort. The only way to gain a breath at all would be by pushing oneself up from the legs and feet or pulling ones off up by the arms, either of which would cause intense agony. Add to this primary factor, the following secondary ones, bodily functions uncontrolled, insects feasting on wounds and orifices, unspeakable thirst, muscle cramps, bolts of pain from the severed median nerves in the wrist, scourged back scraping against the wooden post. It is more than any of us are capable of fully imagining. The verbal abuse and other actions such as spitting and throwing refuse by the spectators. Roman soldiers and passersby added the final touch. The New Testament shows us life lived between two worlds, the Roman and the near Middle Eastern crucifixion was noxious enough in Roman eyes. Palestinian attitudes would've found it perhaps even more so. Middle Eastern cultures still have to this day an acute sense of personal honor lodged in the body. An amputation administered as punishment, for instance, would be seen as much more than just physical cruelty or permanent handicap. It would mean that the amputee would carry the visible marks of dishonor and shame for the rest of his or her life. Anything done to the body would've been understood as exceptionally cruel, not just because it inflicted pain, but even more because it caused dishonor. Furthermore, the passion accounts reflect in part a very ancient ritual of humiliation. The mocking of Jesus, the spitting and scorn, the inversion of his kingship and the studious dethronement with the crown of thorns and purple robe would've been understood as a central part of a total right of infamy, of which the crucifixion itself is the culmination. Another aspect of crucifixion not widely noted is that a crucified person gasping and heaving on his cross is forced to be his own executioner. He is not even allowed the perverse dignity of having a human being corresponding to himself who hangs or decapitates him. He dies truly and completely alone with the weight of his own body, killing him as it hangs, causing his own diaphragm to suffocate him." All of this Jesus Christ went through for you, but also for the Father's glory. Let us pray before we partake in communion. Heavenly Father, we are just sickened and nauseous, just pondering just what Christ went through on the cross, the pain, the isolation, the thirst, the sadness. Lord, we cannot fathom. Lord, we do thank you that He came and He bore that for us. And because He bore that, He can identify with us from this moment on in history and our weaknesses and in our pains and conflicts. But most of all, Lord, we thank you that on the cross when He cried out, you did not hear Him, you did not respond. You did forsake him. Lord, he took the full cup of the punishment due for our sin so that we do not have to. We thank you that we do not have to relate with Him in that. We praise you for freeing us from the fear of death, from the fear of eternal torment, which would rightly be due to us had Jesus not gone to the cross for us. Lord, we pray, we thank you. But more as I reflect on tonight, we thank you for your zeal, for your glory. We thank you that to preserve your holy and right name, Lord, you go to such lengths. We thank you that you use your power for all that is good and godly and pure. We thank you for the hope that we have, knowing that as we go forward facing this creation, that is still impacted by Satan, sin, and death. We know that you're working for our good and not against us. Lord, help us to grow in our love and appreciation of you and who you are. You are all together set apart. You are all together holy. And with our limited minds we can only understand that to the degree that you allow us. So I pray, Lord, as we look at the cross, let us grow in our love and knowledge and understanding of you in addition to our appreciation for what you have done for us in Jesus and offering us salvation. Let us find joy walking in communion with you. I pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
To God be the Glory

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 7, 2023 47:15


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Well, good evening. My name is Andy. I'm one of the pastors here at Mosaic along with Pastor Jan and Pastor Shane. And as we say every service, we are glad to have everybody here worshiping with us today. And whether you're new or one of our seasoned attendees, we're thankful to be worshiping with you. If you are not a regular attendee, we invite you out to come on Sunday after this service. We won't hold any announcements at the end of the service today. Come out, we have services at 9:15 and 11:15 AM. Bring friends, bring family, and just come celebrate the resurrection, as tonight we'll be a little more intense. But we're glad that you're here and we're always praying for the Lord to send us people asking questions about Christianity, asking questions about the cross of Jesus Christ. And praying that the Lord would also send seasoned saints to come and just take up the labor, the mission here with us in Boston. Tonight, I'm going to have just a meditation on God's zeal for His glory, how good Friday shows God's zeal for His glory. And before we do so, I just want to jump in and pray. Heavenly Father, we praise You that You are God. You are worthy of our worship. You speak to us through Your creation. When we look upon all that is good in this world, we see Your fingerprint upon it. When we look upon other human lives, we see Your presence. We see some of the character attributes that You have passed on. Lord, when we look upon Your word, most importantly, we see Your love for us. We see this Bible from the third chapter through the finish, talking about man's fall to sin and Your plan to be the solution to that, to crush the serpent on the head, and to come and be both the priest and the sacrifice of the atonement for our sins. And Lord, we praise You for sending Jesus Christ who is our brother, but is also our God. We thank You that He took on flesh to be tempted and tried in every way. He took on flesh to know the challenges firsthand that we face in this life. And Lord, He took on flesh to walk perfectly under your law in the way that we could not. And we thank you Lord that He came, He lived for the primary purpose of going to the cross for Your lost children. And He went and He bore the full wrath that is due for all of our sins and the work is finished. We praise You that as we look upon Good Friday, as we look upon Christ, we know that it is finished. And Lord, it's sad, it sickens us to know what Christ went through us. But we praise You for that. We praise You that we can say ultimately You have worked the great travesty of the cross for Your good, for Your glory, for our salvation. We pray right now. Lord, just show us more of Your heart. Let us not get lost in thinking what this day means and offers to us. Let's not just seek an emotional religious experience, Lord. Let us grow further and further in love with your heart. I pray these things in Jesus's name. Amen. Now to start, I want to read from Matthew ... Excuse me, Mark chapter 15 and I'll read the whole chapter, I think it's 1-47, Mark chapter 15 verses 1-47. "And as soon as it was morning, the chief priest held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council. And they bound Jesus and led him away and delivered him over to Pilate. And Pilate asked him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?' And he answered him, 'You have said so.' And the chief priest accused him of many things. And Pilate again asked him, 'Have you no answer to make? See how many charges they bring against you?' But Jesus made no further answer, so that Pilate was amazed. Now at the feast he used to release for them one prisoner for whom they asked. And among the rebels in prison, who had committed murder in the insurrection, there was a man called Barabbas. And the crowd came up and began to ask Pilate to do as he usually did for them. And he answered them saying, 'Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?' For he perceived that it was out of envy that the chief priest had delivered him up. But the chief priest stirred up the crowd to have him release for them Barabbas instead. And Pilate again said to them, 'Then what shall I do with the man you call the King of the Jews?' And they cried out again, 'Crucify him.' And Pilate said to them, 'Why? What evil has he done?' But they shouted all the more, 'Crucify him.' So Pilate wishing to satisfy the crowd, released for them Barabbas. And having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor's headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. And they clothed him a in a purple cloak and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. And they began to salute him, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him. And they comp compelled a passerby, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry the cross. And they brought him to the place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull). And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take. And it was the third hour when they crucified him. And the inscription of the charge against him read, 'The King of the Jews.' And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, 'Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself and come down from the cross!' So also the chief priest with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, 'He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the King of Israel come down now from the cross that we may see and believe.' Those who were crucified with him also reviled him. And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, 'Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?' 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' And some of the bystanders hearing it said, 'Behold, he is calling Elijah.' And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink and said, 'Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down.' And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, "Truly this man was the Son of God!' There were also women looking on from a distance among whom were Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James and the younger and of Joses and Salome. When he was in Galilee, they followed him and ministered to him, and there were also many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem." "And when evening had come, since it was the day of preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate was surprised to hear that he should have already died. And summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he was already dead. And when he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the corpse to Joseph. And Joseph brought a linen shroud, and taking him down, wrapped him in the linen shroud and laid him in a tomb that had been cut out of the rock. And he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw where he was laid." This is the reading of God's holy word. It's in this, the blood of Christ, His crucifixion, and on Sunday, his resurrection that we boast as Christians. To start, I'm glad that Caleb in the introduction said Happy Good Friday because it's just a confusing day. This is the most solemn day of the year for the church, yet it really is one of the most joyful days. Today we celebrate the cross of Jesus Christ. And I come from a lot of ... I've been through a few traditions of Christianity before I came to Mosaic. And there's a lot of questions about how to approach Good Friday. And so I want to start by just making a couple critiques of the typical approach of Good Friday. There's one where people come and on Good Friday, there's this extra pressure to come and think about what Christ went through for me. Wow. Look how far, look at the ridicule, look at the mockery, look at the physical pain, look at the sin, the wrath that He bore for me. And I want to say keep doing that. We have to keep doing that for at the cross we boast He who knew us and became sin, so in Him we might become the righteousness of God. And there's a tendency though, to just get one side of the Good Friday story. And it's when you really just think about, wow, what did Jesus go through for me, what you miss out on is, is your heart being taken to worship of God. What does the cross, how does this direct me to worship of God? And so this point's a little confusing. I say, don't make this the only thing that you do. As you contemplate the weight that Christ bore on the cross, you should be in awe and astonishment and wonder about what He did for you. You should grimace as you read the gospel story, the crucifixion story. You should grimace as we take communion and you eat the bread and drink the juice, the wine. You should grimace, almost feel sick as I go through a reading to close out my portion of this message that will tell you and explain more details of the crucifixion than you could have ever wanted to know. But you don't want to make it the primary thing. And there's just beneath this wow what he did for me, some Christians can just get lost. We say that Jesus Christ, He is our Lord and He is our savior. And we get stuck in our faith just saying, "Wow, he's my savior. What has he done for me?" But beneath that is really me, me, me, instead of wow, God, God, God, look at what God has done. And so I challenge you today, think. I said this is a message where we're talking about God's zeal for his glory. As I preach to you right now, ask the Lord to show you what does Good Friday teach me about God Himself? Not what does Good Friday do for me? And so that's a nuanced point. You want to feel the weight. You should feel the weight. You have the law of God standing over you in this dark building right now. I just read Mark, the crucifixion story. You should be feeling it, but don't let that be the only thing. Don't let that be the primary thing. And next, I just want to critique. A lot of people come to a Good Friday service to tremble and really just get that little taste of religious experience, of emotional experience that will just carry them forward in their life. There's a famous hymn that really I think captures this tendency for Good Friday and it's, were you there when they crucified my Lord. I think a lot of people know that. And the lyrics go: Were you there when you crucified my Lord? Were you there when you crucified my Lord? Oh. If you know the song, you know that I do not have the capacity to sing it. Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble. And I used to attend a church that sang this song on every Good Friday and I really looked forward to it. It's catchy. Guys like Johnny Cash sang it. But I think this approach captures, reveals the wrong mindset. It reveals a mindset of I just want to tremble. I just want to be shaken a little bit as I engage God, as I engage His holy scriptures. And this has shown, some Christians who are regular church attendees, we fall into this. But many people come out once a year, let me go get my fix, let me go get right before God by doing this. And it's not the right way. What's the problem? We only want to sometimes tremble. We want to pause and be shaken a bit. And what Good Friday teaches is that it's not about us. It's not about coming to get a religious experience. And you can come and do that every week at Mosaic and hopefully it goes beyond that to your heart. But Good Friday, first and foremost is about God and His zeal for His glory. And if your mind, as you ponder just the weight that Christ bore for you, if you come and you have this religious experience, but you don't get taken up to worship and awe and wonder at the glory of God and his character, then we have failed in this service. You are either after the wrong thing in your approach or we as a church are not taking you to the heavenly of heavenlys, taking you into the presence of God. And Jesus knew this. He knew that the cross was all about God's glory. Right before He was betrayed by Judas and handed to the authorities Christ prayed, "Now is my soul troubled." And this is John chapter 12:27-28. "Now, is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.' Then a voice from heaven came from heaven: 'I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.'" When we observe Good Friday, we tend to get so caught up in the thinking about the power and ambiance of Christ, of the situation of the service. We get so caught up in thinking about what does this mean for me? What's the point of coming out here? How does this add to my personal walk in the faith? But in doing so, we miss what God is trying to teach us about himself. And what is that God has a zeal. He's teaching us, God, I have a zeal for my glory, first and foremost. What is Christ's passion? This week where we talk about his suffering in holy week, it's a storm, literally the sky went black, probably felt a lot like this for several hours of the day in Jerusalem, while Christ was on the cross. The cross is the storm. The fury of God's just rest, the whole cup of it for all sins, past, present, and future of his children. And our engagement in one of the events in Christ's life with a storm should teach us how to take lessons from this storm on the cross. Mark 4:36-41 says, "And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep in the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, 'Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?' And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, 'Peace! Be still!' And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, 'Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?' And they're filled with great fear and said to one another, 'Who then is this, that even the wind in the sea obey him?'" So what's the situation at the end of this storm scene? Imagine just being in a boat with waves just rocking over your head, the winds just loud howling in your ears, rain's coming down, thunder, lightning, and Jesus is there sleeping and he wakes up and he says, "Peace. Be still." The situation at the end is that the disciples are left more scared as they ponder the nature of Jesus than they were by the storm that was rocking them a moment ago. "Who is this man? Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him," they ask. And that's how our engagement with the storm of Good Friday should be when we think about God. We should ask, "Who is this God?" When we get a greater glimpse at the lens he goes to preserve his just, his righteous, his glorious nature, it should shake us to the core, not just give us a little tremble. It should inspire us to turn to get right with him through Christ immediately and should change us all together from the inside out. And this is in several parts of scripture. Where do I give this primarily tonight? Romans chapter 3:21-26. It says, "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus for all who believe. For there is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." I think these verses contain the most important paragraph on the atonement in the Bible, and that's not biblical. That's just my after me really digging into it in this season and in the past. What do these verses say? They say that beneath God's pursuit of our justification, our being made right before him and forgiveness, beneath our justification and forgiveness in sending to the cross was the pursuit of God to clear his own name. Verse 25 can be understood as "God put Christ forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins." The text tells us that until Christ sacrifice on the cross, God's righteousness is at stake. His name was in need of vindication. Why is that the case? Why did God face the problem of needing to give a public vindication of his righteousness? The answer it's provided in verse 25, "because in his divine forbearance, he had passed over former sins." Now what does that mean? It means that for millennia, God had been doing what Psalm 103 verse 10 says. "He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities." Think King David. He sends a man off to war to get killed so that he can marry his wife and the prophet Nathan tells him his sins are forgiven and David gets to continue to serve as king. There's no punishment in the kingdom, and he's not stricken dead. And that's offensive. Why is passing over of sin of forgiveness such a problem? Well, what is sin? Romans 3:23 says, "For all sin and fall short of the glory of God," or translated literally, "all of sinned and lacked the glory of God." Sin is related to glory and it's understood as a lacking or losing of it. When Adam sinned, he lost the glory that came with being a sinless image bearer of the trial of God. How did he lose his glory? He exchanged that glory which was inherent in his nature as an image bearer of God for something offered to him in the creation. All sin is a preference for the temporary pleasures of things found within the finite creation over the everlasting joy of eternal fellowship with the creator. Sin is a failing to love God's glory above everything else. Altogether sin might be understood as an effort to rob God of his glory, or that sin is a rebellion against God's glory. Therefore, the problem when God passes over sin is that God seems to condone the behavior of those who commit sin. He seems to be saying it is a matter of indifference that his glory is spurned. He seems to condone the low assessment of who He is, His righteousness, His worth from the sinner. Where the passing over of sin communicates that God's glory and His righteous governance are of little or no value to the sinner. But according to Romans, this is the most basic problem that God solved by the death on his son. Verse 25 and 26 say, "This, God's putting Christ his son forward to die was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time." So God, he could have settled accounts with man by not saving anybody and punishing all sinners with hell. This would've demonstrated that He does not condone our falling short of his glory or the belittling of His honor. But God did not will to condemn everyone like that. John 3:17 says, "God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him." This truth we know well. We know well that God is for us. We know that our salvation is God's goal in sending Jesus. But today I'm asking, do you know the foundation of God's rescue plan for his children? Do you know that there is a deeper goal in the father's sending of the son? Do you know that God's love for us depends on a deeper love, namely God's love for his own glory? Do you know that God's desire to save sinners rest on a deeper desire, namely God's desire to vindicate his righteousness? Do you realize that the accomplishment of our salvation does not center on us, but on God's zeal for his own glory? The big question of the cross is not can we be saved, but can Christ repair the glory of God for the people of God? And the resounding answer of the Bible is yes. Christ drank the full cup of God's wrath for the sins of his children, past, present, future when he went to the cross and first and foremost for God the Father, then for us. So this is why is it important to understand, meditate upon Good Friday. It shows us that the cross is the foremost display of God's love for sinners. Not because it demonstrates the value of sinners, but because it vindicates the value of God for sinners to enjoy. God's love for man does not consist in making man central, but in making Himself central to man. The cross doesn't direct man's attention to His own vindicated worth, but to God's vindicated righteousness. This is love, God pursuing His own glory because the only eternal happiness for man is happiness focused on the riches of God's glory. Psalm 16:11 says, "In your presence there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore." God's self-exaltation, it's loving because it preserves for us and offers to us the only fully satisfying object of desire in the universe, Himself, the all glorious, all righteous God. If God doesn't correct things, if God doesn't make sure that there is payment for sins, he is not worthy to be God. At the cross your view of God and His character and love of God and His character, they should expand. He destroys any formulations of a God that we could have contrived by our own personal preferences. He destroys any construction of God that could have been contrived by the primary ideals of our day, our culture, our country, our government. At the cross, you don't just tremble. Sometimes but are shaken to the core. Who is this God that chases after his own glory with such zeal? At the cross, you see that you're not the center of things. Your glory and joy are not at the center of life and history, but God and his glory and joy are. You see that you're just blessed that He even offers a chance to walk beside Him in life despite your sin through faith in Jesus Christ. At the cross you see most clearly on Good Friday that you are a mere creature made for worship of the good, holy, and wise God. At the cross you see that God is both just and the justifier. You cherish the fact that he has procured your salvation through the sending of the Son and the fact of His righteous character. At the cross you'll find that to be loved intimately is to be forgiven, cleansed and enabled to see and to feel the wonder that the Father has for himself and that Christ has for the Father and that the spirit has for them both. To close my speaking portion before we partake ... Oh, excuse me, what the cross is it's the Grand Canyon. God doesn't take us to Mount Washington, a cheap New England wannabe. Now the cross, God takes us to the Grand Canyon. He displays the full majesty of who he is. He shows a zeal for righteousness, holiness, perfection, all glories, preserves them and says, "Look upon me. Look upon how great I am. Look at how holy set apart from all other as I am and be holy before me, because that is what is best for you." And praise God, he doesn't say that to us in our sin without hope, for we know that without Jesus Christ, who was perfect, who was holy, while we are sinners, we can look to Christ and have peace with him. We can look to God and know that He in all of His glory and power and splendor, the might of His good hand is working towards us for all of eternity in Jesus. And so to close my portion before we partake in communion together, I want to read a really long excerpt that does spend a lot of time making me say, "Wow, look what God has done for me." But as you read it, I want you to test yourself. I want you to test yourself. When you look at the death, the crucifixion of Christ, do you look simply to be shaken, to tremble a little? Or as a reader, are you only thinking, "Wow, look at what God has done for me," and not go beyond that? Or are you brought to praise and wonder to see the lens that God goes to preserve his glorious and righteous character for your eternal satisfaction in him? I'm going to read a long section from Fleming Rutledge's book, The Crucifixion: Understanding the Death of Jesus Christ. "It is formidably difficult to understand the cross today in its original context after 2000 years in which it has been domesticated, romanticized, idealized, and misappropriated. Occasionally a modern interpreter struggling to find some correspondence that can be grasped by people today will compare the cross of Roman times to the American electric chair. This is an adequate analogy for a number of reasons as we shall see, but we can learn a few things from it. Imagine revering an electric chair. Imagine using it as the focal point in our churches, hanging small replicas around our necks, carrying it aloft in procession and bow bowing our heads as it passes. The absurdity of this scenario can readily be grasped, but other features in the comparison might help us. For instance, the electric chair when it was still used was almost always used for executing the lowest class of criminal and majority of them black with no powerful connections or other resources. Similarly, the Romans virtually never used the cross for executing people who had occupied high positions and never for Roman citizens. Another point of contact is the contradictory response of revulsion and attraction familiar to anyone who has ever slowed to look at a wreck on a highway. Even the most fastidious person when confronted by a photograph of an electric chair, let alone the real thing, will experience a disturbing fascination. There have always been people who specialize in coming to cheer and applaud executions when they took place, whether lynchings, hangings, or electrocutions. That is what undoubtedly happened on Calvary when Jesus was nailed to the cross and left there to die. Crowds of people then as now took pleasure in reviling the one who is being put to death. When they became bored with this pastime, they went safely home to their comforts and gave the victim no further thought. 'It is nothing to you, all you who passed by,' Lamentations 1:12. But there are very important differences. Electrocutions were at least theoretically supposed to be humane and quick, but crucifixion as a method of execution was specifically designed to intensify and prolong agony. In this sense, the cross was infinitely more dreadful than the electric chair, odious, though the chair was. Another difference is that the person to be electrocuted is permitted the dignity of a mask or a hood, presumably so that the privilege of the face noted by Susan Sontag would be protected. Most important of all, electrocutions took place indoors out of public view with only a few select people permitted to watch. Crucifixion, on the other hand, was supposed to be seen by as many people as possible. The basement resulting from public display was a chief feature of the method along with the prolonging of the agony. It was a form of advertisement or public announcement. 'This person is the scum of the earth, not fit to live, more an insect than a human being.' The crucified wretch was pinned up like a specimen. Crosses were not placed out in the open for convenience or sanitation, but for maximum public exposure. Crucifixion as a means of execution in the Roman Empire had its express purpose, the elimination of victims from consideration as members of the human race. It cannot be said too strongly that it was its function. It was meant to indicate to all who might be toying with subversive ideas that crucified persons were not of the same species as either the executioners or the spectators, and were therefore not only expendable, but also deserving of ritualized extermination. Therefore, the mocking and jeering that accompanied crucifixion were not only allowed, they're part of the spectacle and were programmed into it. In a sense, crucifixion was a form of entertainment. Everyone understood that the specific role of the passerby was to exacerbate the dehumanization and degradation of the person had thus been designated to be a spectacle. Crucifixion was cleverly designed, we might say diabolically designed, to be an almost theatrical enactment of the sadistic and inhumane impulses that lie within human beings. According to the Christian gospel, the Son of God voluntarily and purposefully absorbed all of that, drawing it into himself. Anyone seeking to interpret Jesus crucifixion must decide whether or not to include a clinical description. Since the New Testament writers are conspicuously silent about the physical details, it is legitimate to ask whether it is suitable or helpful to introduce them. On the other hand, people in New Testament times had all seen crucifixions and did not need a description. The evangelists and the other New Testament writers were able to assume a familiarity with the method that is unthinkable for us today. Most of us have never even come close to see anyone tortured to death. 'For this reason,' as Martin Hengel writes, 'reflection on the harsh reality of crucifixion and antiquity may help us to overcome the acute loss of reality, which is to be found so often present in theology and preaching.' The early theologian originally called Jesus death the utterly vile death on the cross. Cicero, the great Roman statesman and writer referred to the crucifixion as the supreme penalty, exceeding burning and decapitation and gruesomeness. Some rudimentary knowledge of what was taking place will help us to understand these terms. The first phase of a Roman execution was scourging. The lictors, Roman legionnaires assigned to this duty used a whip made of leather cords to which small pieces of metal or bone had been fastened. Paintings of the scouring of Jesus had always shown him with a loin cloth but in fact the victim would've been naked, tied to a post in a position to expose the back and buttocks to maximum effect. With the first strokes of the scourge, skin would be pulled away and subcutaneous tissue exposed. As the process continued, the lacerations would begin to tear into the underlying skeletal muscles. This would result not only in a great pain but also in appreciable blood loss. The idea was to weaken the victim to a state just short of collapse or death. It was common for taunting and ridicule to accompany the procedure. In the case of Jesus, the New Testament tells us that a crown of thorns, a purple robe and a mock scepter were added to intensify the mockery. The condition of a prisoner after scourging just prior to crucifixion would depend upon several things. Previous physical condition, the enthusiasm of the lictors and the extent of blood loss. In the case of Jesus, these things cannot be known. But the fact that he was apparently unable to carry the crossbar himself would indicate that he was probably in a severely weakened state and he may have been close to circulatory shock. Those being crucified were then paraded through the streets, exposing them to the full scorn of the population. When the procession reached the site of the crucifixion, the victims would see before them the heavy upright wooden post permanently in place to which the crossbar, sorry, they have the Latin terms, to which the crossbar would be joint. The person was to be crucified. The person to be crucified would be thrown down on his back, exacerbating the pain of the wounds from the scourging and introducing dirt into them. His hands would be tied or now to the crossbar. Nailing seams to have been preferred by the Romans. Ossuary finds have given us a clearer idea of how this was done. 2000 years of Christian iconography notwithstanding that nails were not driven into the palms which could not support the weight of a man's body, but into the wrists. The long stake of the cross was then hoisted onto the crossbar with the victim dependent from it, and the feet were tied or nailed. At this point, the process of crucifixion proper began. Victims of crucifixion lived on their crosses for periods varying from three or four hours or to three or four days. It has often been remarked that Jesus ordeal is relatively brief. Perhaps he was weakened by the scourging or had lost more blood than usual or suffered cardiac rupture. We cannot know. In any sense, it has been surmised that the major pathophysiological effect of crucifixion beyond the excruciating pain was a marked interference with normal respiration, particularly exhalation, passive exhalation, which we all do thousand of times a day without thinking about it, becomes impossible for a person hanging on a cross. The weight of a body hanging by its wrists would depress the muscles required for breathing out. Therefore, each exiled breath could only be achieved by a tremendous effort. The only way to gain a breath at all would be by pushing oneself up from the legs and feet or pulling ones off up by the arms, either of which would cause intense agony. Add to this primary factor, the following secondary ones, bodily functions uncontrolled, insects feasting on wounds and orifices, unspeakable thirst, muscle cramps, bolts of pain from the severed median nerves in the wrist, scourged back scraping against the wooden post. It is more than any of us are capable of fully imagining. The verbal abuse and other actions such as spitting and throwing refuse by the spectators. Roman soldiers and passersby added the final touch. The New Testament shows us life lived between two worlds, the Roman and the near Middle Eastern crucifixion was noxious enough in Roman eyes. Palestinian attitudes would've found it perhaps even more so. Middle Eastern cultures still have to this day an acute sense of personal honor lodged in the body. An amputation administered as punishment, for instance, would be seen as much more than just physical cruelty or permanent handicap. It would mean that the amputee would carry the visible marks of dishonor and shame for the rest of his or her life. Anything done to the body would've been understood as exceptionally cruel, not just because it inflicted pain, but even more because it caused dishonor. Furthermore, the passion accounts reflect in part a very ancient ritual of humiliation. The mocking of Jesus, the spitting and scorn, the inversion of his kingship and the studious dethronement with the crown of thorns and purple robe would've been understood as a central part of a total right of infamy, of which the crucifixion itself is the culmination. Another aspect of crucifixion not widely noted is that a crucified person gasping and heaving on his cross is forced to be his own executioner. He is not even allowed the perverse dignity of having a human being corresponding to himself who hangs or decapitates him. He dies truly and completely alone with the weight of his own body, killing him as it hangs, causing his own diaphragm to suffocate him." All of this Jesus Christ went through for you, but also for the Father's glory. Let us pray before we partake in communion. Heavenly Father, we are just sickened and nauseous, just pondering just what Christ went through on the cross, the pain, the isolation, the thirst, the sadness. Lord, we cannot fathom. Lord, we do thank you that He came and He bore that for us. And because He bore that, He can identify with us from this moment on in history and our weaknesses and in our pains and conflicts. But most of all, Lord, we thank you that on the cross when He cried out, you did not hear Him, you did not respond. You did forsake him. Lord, he took the full cup of the punishment due for our sin so that we do not have to. We thank you that we do not have to relate with Him in that. We praise you for freeing us from the fear of death, from the fear of eternal torment, which would rightly be due to us had Jesus not gone to the cross for us. Lord, we pray, we thank you. But more as I reflect on tonight, we thank you for your zeal, for your glory. We thank you that to preserve your holy and right name, Lord, you go to such lengths. We thank you that you use your power for all that is good and godly and pure. We thank you for the hope that we have, knowing that as we go forward facing this creation, that is still impacted by Satan, sin, and death. We know that you're working for our good and not against us. Lord, help us to grow in our love and appreciation of you and who you are. You are all together set apart. You are all together holy. And with our limited minds we can only understand that to the degree that you allow us. So I pray, Lord, as we look at the cross, let us grow in our love and knowledge and understanding of you in addition to our appreciation for what you have done for us in Jesus and offering us salvation. Let us find joy walking in communion with you. I pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Finish Well

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 2, 2023 48:27


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Over the last 11 weeks we have been looking at some of just the super essential, practical, non-negotiable commitments that all of us as followers of Jesus need to make in order to grow in our faith, in order to persevere in our faith, in order to experience the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give us. And if you have your Bibles, open up to Matthew chapter 24. The title of today's sermon as we finish this series is, Commit to Finish Well. And on the surface that might sound a little bit redundant because that that's really what commitment is. The whole purpose of commitment is to see something through to completion. And the whole reason you need to make commitments, it only is necessary when you're attempting to do something that's going to be difficult, that you're going to be tempted to give up on or possibly quit. And Jesus promised to give us abundant life. We looked at that when we began this series, but that doesn't mean that the Christian life is going to be an easy life. That the abundant life that Jesus talks about, yeah, it comes with peace that passes understanding. It comes with joy and contentment and hope, but it comes with its fair share of difficulties as well. The Christian life is we live in this tension of both tribulation and hope that John 16:33, Jesus told his disciples, "I have said these things to you, that in me, you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart, for I have overcome the world." This is the tension that we live in as followers of Christ, that in this world we will be faced with tribulations, with temptation, persecution, with many trials. And there will be times when we are tempted to give up. There will be times where all we can do is hold on to the hope that we have in Jesus Christ and do what he calls us to do, which is to endure, to overcome these tribulations by standing firm, by persevering, by holding fast until he returns so that we may finish well. It's a race that we must run with endurance, but as we're going to see in our text today, it's also a race that could come to an end at any moment. And at the heart of our text today, we're going to be looking at a really large passage of scripture and I'm going to talk a little bit more about that and introduce it here in a little bit. But at the heart of this passage, Matthew chapter 24 is verse 36 through 44 where Jesus says this, he says, "But concerning that day and hour, no one knows." And he's talking about his return, "not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as in the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, and marrying and giving in marriage until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away." And he says, "So will be the coming of the Son of Man. Two men will be in the field, one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the middle, one will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known and what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore, you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming in an hour you do not expect." And the big idea is that Jesus is coming back. No one knows exactly when, but when he comes, he says it's going to be like some people are asleep. That they're just completely caught off guard unaware by his return. It's going to be like in the days of Noah, people are just going on with their lives, ignoring the warnings coming from the Prophet Noah until that day when the flood comes and just swept them all the way. And he says, "It's going to be like that. When I return some people are going to be caught off guard as if they were asleep. But others," Jesus said, "well, they're going to be wide awake. They're going to be ready, waiting for Jesus' return." And Jesus doesn't tell us exactly when he's going to return, but he does teach us how to be ready for his return. And that's what we're going to be focusing on today. Today as we've said, is Palm Sunday. In the passage that I just read, it comes from a larger passage of scripture that's often referred to as the Olivet Discourse. It's in Matthew chapter 24 through 25. And in Matthew's gospel, this is the sermon that Jesus preached on the Mount of Olives to his disciples sometime after his triumphal entry on Palm Sunday, but before his crucifixion on Good Friday. And there's way too much here for us to get through all of it verse by verse today. But we are going to get through most of it section by section. And as we do, we're going to be looking at five lessons, five steps that Jesus gives us that will enable us to be ready for his return, five areas that we need to endure in, in order to run this race and to finish well. And so the outline of today's sermon, Five steps to Finishing Well. The first step is to endure in hope. This is the beginning of Matthew chapter 24. Point two, endure in obedience. That's the end of chapter 24. Third, endure in faith. That's the beginning of chapter 25. Endure in mission. And then finally at the end of his sermon is the call to endure in love. Before we jump into the first point of today's sermon, would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? Father, we thank you that you are a good and a just God. That you will not tolerate sin and evil forever, that a day is coming when you will judge the world in righteousness, where all sin will be accounted for, either in hell for all of eternity as it deserves, or on the cross by Jesus Christ in our place. Jesus, we thank you for your sacrifice. We thank you for taking the punishment, the wrath that our sins deserve so that we can look to your coming, not with the fear of punishment, but with the hope of salvation, of deliverance. That you have saved us, you've justified us, you've saved us from the penalty of our sin, that you right now by the power of your Holy Spirit are saving us, delivering us from the power of sin in our lives. And that you will come again to once and for all time deliver us from the very presence of sin for all of eternity. We long for, we look to that day. And Lord, we pray as we do that you would give us the strength to endure. That by the power of your Holy Spirit we would persevere for the glory of your name. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. All right, point number one today is to endure in hope. And this comes from the beginning, Matthew chapter 24. Beginning in verse one, Matthew sets the context for us. He says that, "Jesus left the temple and was going away when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. But he answered them, 'You see these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.'" And then later, "As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, 'Tell us when these things will be? What will be the sign of your coming at the end of the age?' And Jesus answered them, see that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name saying, 'I am the Christ,' and they will lead many astray. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All of these are but the beginning of the birth pains. Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." And so Matthew begins, he sets the context for us. Jesus and his disciples, they're in Jerusalem and he begins to notice that his disciples are, they're starstruck by the impressive buildings, the stones of the temple. And he answers them. In verse three he says, "You see these things?" He says, "Listen to me. Truly, I say to you, there's not going to be one of these stones left on top of another. They're all going to be thrown down." And then his disciples come to in verse three and says, "Well, tell us Jesus, what are you talking about? When are these things going to happen? What are going to be the signs of your coming at the end of the age?" And then Jesus begins to answer their question. And as you read the next two chapters, it becomes clear that Jesus' answer is not so crystal clear. That he doesn't give him a straightforward, "Well, here's the time and here's the date." And actually what you see is that as he answers, he seems to be actually describing multiple different events all at the same time. Events that are distinct, but that are in some ways similar, some ways connected. On the one hand he's predicting the literal fall of Jerusalem. He's predicting the literal destruction of the temple, a prediction that actually came true within the lifetime of his own disciples. That happened, we know this from history. Now, on the other hand, when you look at the larger context of Matthew and especially the Gospel of John, we see that Jesus often compared the destruction of the temple to the destruction of his physical body, that he was foreshadowing his crucifixion and his resurrection. And this is why a few chapters later in Matthew 26, when Jesus is standing trial, well, some of his accusers come and say in Matthew 26:61 that, "This man said he was able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days." Well, we know Jesus actually did say something like that, but he wasn't referring to the literal temple at that time. He was talking about himself. That he was going to be crucified, buried, and that three days later he was going to rise from the death. Now, on the other hand, Jesus is clearly not just talking about himself. He's clearly not just talking about the temple, he's talking about the end of the world. And so he's preparing his disciples for God's judgment. He's preparing his disciples for the judgment of God that was going to be poured out on him later that week on the cross in their place for their sins. And he's also teaching them about the judgment of God that was going to fall on the whole temple system, that this was going to be a sign. That that old temple with its old, it wasn't needed anymore, because Jesus had come to fulfill all of that. Jesus was the true temple, the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit. And his disciples were as well as the Holy Spirit came to dwell in them and that they didn't need the priests and the sacrifices. Jesus was the high priest. Jesus was the sacrifice. But then thirdly, he's foreshadowing the judgment of God that was going to someday day come on all of creation. There was going to come a day when Jesus is going to return to judge the world in righteousness and to make all things new. And the apostle Peter later on in his life, he wrote in second Peter chapter three, remembering the words of Jesus. He quotes him in II Peter 3:10, "That the day of the Lord will come like a thief." And then he says, "The heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved and the earth and all the works that are done on it will be exposed." Nothing's going to be hidden from the judgment of God. And so verse 11 he says, "Since these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness in godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn. But what is our hope? Verse 13, "But according to his promise we are waiting for a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells." And this should cause the enemies of God to tremble in fear, to humble themselves and repent. But the reason that Jesus is telling his disciples this is because he wants them. He needs them to fix their eyes on this hope, because this hope is going to be the only thing that is going to allow them, enable them to persevere the tribulation that is about to come. And we need the hope of Jesus' return, because as we wait for his return, the truth is, things are going to get pretty bad. That before Jesus returns to rescue his church and lead us to glory, Satan is going to do everything he can to ravage the church and lead us astray. Jesus continues in verse four and he says, and so therefore he says, "See that no one leads you astray. For many are going to come into my name, saying, 'I am the Christ and they will lead many astray. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you're not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. And all of these are but the beginning of the birth pains. And then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.'" Jesus warns about three tactics that Satan, that the enemy is going to use, three categories of tribulation that he's going to wield against the church in order to lead us astray. In the first category we see. The first category of tribulation we see is that of trials. And what I mean by trials here, as Jesus talks about, there's going to be times of great difficulty. Wars, rumors of wars, famines, earthquakes, pestilence, disease, that he says, "There's going to be an increase in lawlessness. That it will just become common for people to lie, to cheat, to murder, to steal. And that these trials, they're going to be experienced, they're going to be common to everyone, but that Satan is going to use them in order to lead people astray. To lead people away from God, to lead them to extinguish their love, to grow cold in their love for God and their love for one another." And Jesus refers to these tribulations as birth pains. That they'll come and they'll go. They'll ebb and they'll flow throughout human history. And every time they do it's going to feel like the end of the world. It's going to feel like things couldn't possibly get any worse. And that these cycles of tribulation, they're going to come, they're going to continue until eventually a time of great tribulation, which the church will have to endure. But this will take place immediately before the return of Christ. It'll be painful, they'll be scary, but the hope is that these pains are leading to something glorious. And Jesus doesn't try to sugarcoat it. He says, "It's going to be bad." But he says in verse 13, "But listen, the one who endures to the end will be saved." And so in the trials of life, dear Christian, endure. The second category we see, the second category of tribulation is that of persecution. Verse nine, it says, "They will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another." Again, like the pangs of trials, persecutions, they come and go throughout church history and as they do, Jesus says, "They're going to cause some Christians to fall away, to turn against one another, to even hate one another." And I think a lot of people think that Christian persecution, oh, that's just something of the past. That's maybe something the early church experienced under the Roman Empire, but that doesn't happen today. Well, nothing could be further from the truth. It is estimated that since the dawn of the church, 70 million Christians have been martyred for their faith in Jesus Christ, 70 million. And over half of those took place within the last 100 years. And estimated around a 100,000 Christians are martyred every year, because they bear the name of Christ. And those of us who grew up here in America, we don't think about this often, because the world doesn't want to look at it. The world turns away from it, pretends like it's not happening. And much of it is happening far away on the other side of the world. I think a lot of Christians got a wake-up this week, these demonic evil attack that took place at the Covenant Christian School in Tennessee. It was a young woman who hated God, who hated Christians and targeted her rage at a Christian school. Satanically murdered three adults, three children, and I don't use that word satanic lightly. What is persecution? Persecution is what happens, when Satan tempts a person to love their sin and their perversion so much that they are willing to kill for it, rather than look to the one who loved them so much that he was willing to die for it, to die for them. It's demonic, it's evil, it's satanic and it's heart-wrenching when it hits so close to home. But this is a reality that many Christians throughout history and around the world today face every single day. This is the reality that got Jesus nailed to a cross. This is the reality that led every one of his apostles to a brutal martyr's death. That when the general calamity of the trials of life are not enough to pull us away, well then Satan is not above using specifically targeted evil at the people of God through the form of persecution. And sometimes it's social coercion, sometimes it's economic exclusion, sometimes it's threats and acts of violence. And Jesus warns us, verse nine, "They'll deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you'll be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another." Again, he doesn't sugar coat it for us, but he does leave us with this hope in verse 13, "That the one who endures to the end will be saved." So endure in trials, endure in persecution. The third category of tribulation we see in this passage is that of temptation. That Satan, look at verse 11, "Many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because of lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold." And then later in verse 24, he says, "For false christs and false prophets will arise and even perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect." Obviously, that's not possible, but he's trying to communicate how severe the temptation will be. That Satan doesn't always need to use persecution when sometimes all it takes is a little temptation. Sometimes all he needs to do is raise up a false prophet to tell us what we want to hear. Raise up a false pastor who instead of boldly preaching the truth that we need to hear will cower before the crowds and just tell them what they want to hear. This is, I mean these signs, they're everywhere. We see them all around us in this world today, the pains of labor. And when we feel them and when it feels like they've become too much, there's really two ways we can respond. We can look at this rising hatred of God, of persecution against Christians around the world. We can look at the cult of rampant perversion and sexual immorality that is domineering our culture. We can look at the wars, the rumors of wars, the famines, the disaster of the disease. We can look at the alarming apostacy in churches around us that scoff at the Word of God. We can look at these signs and lose heart. We can get discouraged, we can get angry. We can get bitter. We can allow our love to grow cold. We can believe the lie that these pains are just leading to a meaningless death. Or we can believe the truth, that these pains of labor will someday eventually give birth to eternal life, to new creation. And so dear Christian, endure the pains of this tribulation. Pick up your cross and fix your eyes on Jesus, the founder, the perfector of our faith who promises us Matthew 7:13, "That the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few." And then 24:13, "But the one who endures to the end will be saved." And finally, Matthew 24:32. Jesus gives us this beautiful illustration of hope, because after hearing all that, we need some hope. And this is what he says. He says, "From the fig tree learns its lesson, as soon as its branches become tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see all of these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates." I don't know about you, but I am ready for summer in more ways than one. Outside the front window of our apartment we have these two magnolia trees, and right now they look like death. They're barren. There's no leaves. They've got these ugly, fuzzy, grayish, greenish, brownish buds on the end of their branches. But when we see that ugliness, we get a little bit excited because we know what's about to come. We know it's only a matter of time before these buds start to bloom, before this barren tree begins to explode with color, with new life. And I really think this is just the providence of God. I looked out our window this morning and I can see just a few here there, 10, 11, maybe 12 of these buds beginning to open. The signs of life and color peeking through. Jesus may return in our lifetime, or he may not. We don't know the day or the hour. If he doesn't return soon, we have the promise of scripture that he is going to be with us. He will never leave us or forsake us. He will give us the power and the strength to persevere. And if he does return soon, he will do so in power and great glory to save and glorify his church and to put an end to Satan, sin, and death once and for all. In these last few verses of this first passage in verse 29, Jesus tells us, "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the heavens, and the powers of the heaven will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and all of the tribes of earth will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." And so first and foremost, in order to finish, well, we need to endure in this hope. And we see this here in this first section that we've looked at. But now as we look at the rest of Jesus' sermon throughout Matthew through chapter 24 and 25, what we see is that Jesus teaches a series of parables and each one of these shows us another step, another area that we will need to endure in order to finish well. And that we can endure in because of this hope that we have in Jesus Christ. And this really shows us practically what this is going to look like in day-to-day life. Point number one was, endure in hope. Point number two is verses 45 through 51 to endure in obedience. Jesus says in verse 44, "You must also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect." And then he begins to teach this parable. He says, "Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that wicked servant says to himself, 'My master is delayed,' and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him, at an hour that he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place that will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Parables are a lot like jokes. And I don't say that to say that this parable is funny. It's not. This is a very serious and grave warning that Jesus gives us. But they are in the sense that they're the closest, modern equivalent in the sense that a lot of the details in a parable are really meant to get you to the punchline of the parable. They're usually not meant to be read allegorically. They're meant to communicate one big idea, one big aha moment. As we read these parables, we got to ask, "What is the punchline of this parable?" And the punchline of this one Jesus is teaching us is, don't be like this wasted servant living a wasted life. In other words, you need to live every day as if it were your last because it very well could be so. That there is an urgency to our obedience to Christ. And the reason that there is an urgency to obedience is because we all have this tendency to want to put it off, to get to it later. How many of us have been in that place in life where we tell ourselves, "I want to follow Jesus, but I'll get serious and really give him my full obedience someday, later. I just got some stuff I want to do first." I've been there. I was that stereotypical church kid that went off to college and drifted away. And you know this about me, my first semester I joined a band and on the weekends, I wasn't going to church on the weekends, we were driving all over the Midwest, touring, playing shows. And I remember one spring morning we were on some college campus, we'd been up late playing a show the night before. And I don't know, we got up at the crack of like 10:30 or 11:00 and decided to go out and try to find something to eat. As we were driving through town, I see this woman, she's got a nice dress on, she's got a big fancy hat. She's walking down the street by herself waving a palm branch. I was like, "What on earth is she doing?" And then suddenly it dawned on me it was Sunday, today was Palm Sunday. I'd considered myself a Christian, and yet it had been so long since I thought about God or I thought about church, I didn't even realize the season, that Easter was just a week away. I was oblivious. I was like the hypocrite in this parable. And if you're waiting until later to give your full obedience to Christ, that's a really dangerous game to play. Later may never come. And if it does, you might not have the heart to respond when it does. Hebrews three warns us. Hebrews 3:12. It says, "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end." And so endure in obedience so that you may not be hardened by deceitfulness of sin. That's point two. Point three is to endure in faith. And this is the beginning of the next chapter, chapter 25:1-13. Jesus tells us another parable. He says, "Then the kingdom of heaven will be like 10 virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bride groom. Five of them were foolish and five of them were wise. And when the foolish ones took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wises took flasks of oil with their lamps. As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, 'Here's the bridegroom. Come out to meet him.' Then all those virgins rose, trimmed their lamps. And the foolish ones said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' But the wise answered saying, 'Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.' And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. And afterward the other virgins also came saying, 'Lord, Lord, open to us.' But he answered, 'Truly, I say to you, 'I do not know you.' Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.'" So again, we got, this is not an allegory, it's a parable, so the punchline here is, does Jesus know you? He answers the foolish and he says, "Truly I say to you, I do not know you." And this is echoing a statement that he made in the Sermon of the Mount earlier in Matthew chapter seven. He says, "Listen, not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord', will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. And on that day, many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you, depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'" When Jesus returns, he's not going to be impressed with our self-righteous list of accomplishments as we stand before his throne in judgment. The question is, does he know you? Do you have faith? Do you have a relationship with Jesus Christ? Oftentimes we're tempted to put off our obedience to Christ. Well, oftentimes we're often tempted to put off our relationship with Jesus Christ to say, "I'll get serious about my faith later. I'll spend time in fasting and prayer. I'll start to read my Bible later. Someday when I'm less busy, someday when I have more time." Well, later may never come. And the question is, Jesus wants us to feel an urgency that if he came back today, would it be like you're meeting a stranger, or would it be like you're meeting a friend, somebody that you know, someone you have a relationship with? You need to endure in faith. Point number four is to endure in mission. This is verse 14 through 30, Matthew chapter 25. This is the parable of the talents. And we looked at this last week, so I'm not going to read through the whole thing again for us this week, just to give you the CliffsNotes version, the parable of the talents that there's a wealthy master, a wealthy king. He's entrusted three of his servants with a certain amount of money, with a certain number of talents to invest as he departs and goes on a long journey. And then he comes back to settle accounts with them after a long time. And what we're told is that the wicked servant, he took his master's money, he hid it, he buried it in the ground, and when the master comes back he punishes him. But the good servants, they took their master's talents, they invested them faithfully. And when the master comes back, he says to them in verse 23, "Well done, good and faithful servant. You've been faithful over a little, I'll set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master." And last week when we looked at this parable, we looked at it through the lens of giving and generosity. And that's, I think a good way to look at it. It's one of the ways that you can look at it. But ultimately, Jesus was talking about a lot more than just managing money when he was teaching this parable. He wants us, we need to look at this through the lens of God's mission that Jesus is teaching about the Kingdom of God. Now, Jesus is the master, right? He's gone on a long journey. He's ascended into heaven. We don't know the day that he's going to return, but we know that when he does return that he will be back. And while he is gone, he has left us with a mission to accomplish. If you remember back in Matthew 24:14, Jesus tells us this, "That this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." We all love this idea of doing evangelism, of making disciples, of answering God's calling for our life, investing our talents for his kingdom. But so often we are not doing those things now, because again, we keep saying, "Oh, well, I'll do those things someday later." And what we're doing in those moments is we're really acting like the foolish, like the wicked servant. Were burying God's talents in the ground. And Matthew 9:57 we're told that as Jesus and his disciples were going along the road, someone came and he said to him, "Hey Jesus, I'll follow you wherever you go.' And Jesus said to him, "Well, foxes have holes in birds of the airs have nests. But the son of man has nowhere to lay his head." And to another he said, "Follow me." But he said, "Well, Lord, let me first go and bury my father." And Jesus said to him, "Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God." And yet another said, "I will follow you, Lord, but first let me say farewell to those at my home." And Jesus said to him, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God." And obviously Jesus is using a bit of hyperbole here, but the point is clear, that the mission doesn't start tomorrow, the mission starts today. That we cannot put this off. We need to go, proclaim the kingdom of God, keep both hands to the plow and not look back. We need to endure in this mission. And then finally, we're called, at the end of his sermon Jesus calls us to endure in love. That is point number five, Matthew 25:31-46. But first, if you remember back to the beginning of chapter 24, Jesus warned us about this. He said, "That many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold." That we need as the church to endure and love. We need to endure in our love for God, we need to endure and our love for our neighbors, for people in general. But at the end of his sermon here, Jesus gives us a parable in which he is calling us specifically to endure in our love for one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. This is the meaning of the final parable. This is the parable of the sheep and the goats. Matthew 25:31. Jesus says, "When the son of man comes in his glory and all of the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. And before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on his left and then the king will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me in. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison and you came to me." Then the righteous will answer him saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you a drink? When did we see you as stranger and welcome, or you are naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?" And the king will answer them, "Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these, my brothers, you did it to me." And then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink. I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, I was naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me." Then they will also answer saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and not minister to you?" Then he'll answer them saying, "Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me. And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." And I think most of us, at least for myself, whenever I've heard this read or preached, it's usually preached in the sense of, this is a call for Christians to do good works. This is a call for Christians to be charitable and compassionate and to care for those are who are in need. And those are certainly all good things that Christians should do. But that's not the point of what Jesus is talking about here. Because again, so the parable, it's not an allegory. And so what it is the punchline of the parable, it's verse 40, "That the king will answer them, 'Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of," the least of who? "One of the these, my brothers, you did it for me." And when you read the gospels, when Jesus uses that language of the least of these, when he uses the language of my brothers and sisters, he's referring to his disciples. That as Christians we should love our neighbors as ourselves, that we should be charitable and compassionate to people in general. But the big idea that Jesus is talking about here is that this needs to be especially true for how we love and care for our brothers and sisters in Christ. That as Christians, when we love other Christians, when we care for the body of Christ, it says, "If we are caring for Christ himself." And when we don't, we see the warning there as well. Now, we need to think about this in the context of the sermon that Jesus is preaching. Jesus is preaching to a people who are about to face tribulation. And in just a few days he's going to lead the way by going to the cross himself. And I think part of what's going on here is that Jesus is, he's foreshadowing the reality that a time of difficulty was about to come for himself, that he would be crucified, and that when he was his followers, his disciples, his brothers and sisters would be tempted to desert him, to betray, to deny, to be ashamed to associate with him. And that's exactly what happened. But he's also saying, "That a time of difficulty is coming for you, my church as well. And when it does, you're going to be tempted to do the same, to turn against and to abandon one another." And he's reminding us that in those moments when it becomes the most costly, the most inconvenient to love one another, that is precisely when we need to love one another the most. And we have a very direct example of this in the New Testament. In II Timothy chapter one. The apostle Paul writes in second Timothy 1:15, he says to Timothy, "Listen, you are aware of all of those in Asia who turned away from me, among whom were Phygelus and Hermogenes. May the Lord grant mercy to the house of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. But when he arrived in Rome, he searched for me earnestly and found me. May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that day." And so he says, you remember Phygelus and Hermogenes, right? Phygelus, goat, Hermogenes, goat. They're hypocrites. They claim to be followers of Jesus, but they were fakes, they were frauds. When it came time to prove their faith, they were ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ. They turned and they abandoned the apostle Paul. Onesiphorus, now there's a sheep, right? He cared for Paul while he was in prison. He wasn't ashamed to go to him and give him help in his time of need. He's the real goat in the modern sense, not to get too confusing. But you see what's going on here. He cared for Paul. And in caring for Paul, it's as if he cared for Christ. And look at what Paul prays for him in verse 18. He says, "May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that day." On what day? On the day when Jesus comes to separate the sheep from the goats. That as the church we must endure for love and love for one another always, especially when it's hard, especially when it's costly, especially when the world around us hates us. By doing so, we honor Christ and we prove, we test testify to the world that we truly are his disciples. And Jesus, in John 13:34, he tell his disciples, "A new commandment I give to you that you love one another, just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another." And he says, "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have loved one another." And so the five steps to finish well, endure in hope, endure in obedience, endure in faith, endure in mission, endure in love. And Jesus gave this last commandment that we just read. If you remember this, he gave this in the context of the Last Supper, right after having washed his disciples' feet. It says John 13:12. It says, "When he had washed their feet and he put on his outer garment and resumed his place, and he said to them, 'Do you understand what I've done for you? You call me teacher and Lord, and you're right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I've given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed you if you do them, I'm not speaking of all of you, I know whom I have chosen, but the scripture will be fulfilled. He who ate bread has lifted his heel against me.'" He's talking about Judas who would betray him. "But I'm telling you this now before it takes place, that when it does take place, you may believe that I am he, truly, truly, I say to you, whoever receives the one I send receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me." Today is a special day, today is Palm Sunday. It's the beginning of Holy Week and it's fitting that we look to the return of Christ on the day that he first entered, his triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Today is also Communion Sunday, we remember the crowd that cried, hosanna, that welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem as their savior. We also remember that crowd quickly turned into the mob that later that week rejected him as their Lord. And their response, it stands as a warning, as a reminder throughout the ages that our greatest need is not for a savior who is going to come and save us from our circumstances. Our greatest need is for a savior who's going to come and save us from ourselves, save us from our sin, our guilt, our shame from the wrath of God that those things deserve. And communion is a time for us to remember and to give thanks and to celebrate that Jesus Christ came to do just that. Jesus died on the cross to deliver us from the penalty that our sin deserved. That Jesus rose from the grave to deliver us from the power of sin over our lives. And that Jesus is going to come again to judge the living and the dead, and to deliver us from the very presence of sin, a once and for all and for all eternity. God, we thank you for your amazing grace. We thank you that the signs are all around us, that the winter is almost over, that spring and summer are almost here. And that when we see these signs, we know for certain that you are with us. You have promised to be with us always to the very end of the age. And whether that day be soon, or whether that day be long beyond our time here on earth. Lord, I pray that you'd give us the grace and the power to walk faithfully and endure to the end for the sake of your name and glory. That every one of our lives would be used as a witness, as a testimony to your goodness, to your grace, to your power, to your glory. And we thank you for the blood of your son, Jesus Christ that was poured out for us, so that we could be forgiven, so that we could be redeemed from our slavery to sin and adopted into your household as sons and daughters. And we come now as your children and just continue to give you thanks and give you our praise. In Jesus' name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Finish Well

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 2, 2023 48:27


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Over the last 11 weeks we have been looking at some of just the super essential, practical, non-negotiable commitments that all of us as followers of Jesus need to make in order to grow in our faith, in order to persevere in our faith, in order to experience the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give us. And if you have your Bibles, open up to Matthew chapter 24. The title of today's sermon as we finish this series is, Commit to Finish Well. And on the surface that might sound a little bit redundant because that that's really what commitment is. The whole purpose of commitment is to see something through to completion. And the whole reason you need to make commitments, it only is necessary when you're attempting to do something that's going to be difficult, that you're going to be tempted to give up on or possibly quit. And Jesus promised to give us abundant life. We looked at that when we began this series, but that doesn't mean that the Christian life is going to be an easy life. That the abundant life that Jesus talks about, yeah, it comes with peace that passes understanding. It comes with joy and contentment and hope, but it comes with its fair share of difficulties as well. The Christian life is we live in this tension of both tribulation and hope that John 16:33, Jesus told his disciples, "I have said these things to you, that in me, you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart, for I have overcome the world." This is the tension that we live in as followers of Christ, that in this world we will be faced with tribulations, with temptation, persecution, with many trials. And there will be times when we are tempted to give up. There will be times where all we can do is hold on to the hope that we have in Jesus Christ and do what he calls us to do, which is to endure, to overcome these tribulations by standing firm, by persevering, by holding fast until he returns so that we may finish well. It's a race that we must run with endurance, but as we're going to see in our text today, it's also a race that could come to an end at any moment. And at the heart of our text today, we're going to be looking at a really large passage of scripture and I'm going to talk a little bit more about that and introduce it here in a little bit. But at the heart of this passage, Matthew chapter 24 is verse 36 through 44 where Jesus says this, he says, "But concerning that day and hour, no one knows." And he's talking about his return, "not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as in the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, and marrying and giving in marriage until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away." And he says, "So will be the coming of the Son of Man. Two men will be in the field, one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the middle, one will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known and what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore, you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming in an hour you do not expect." And the big idea is that Jesus is coming back. No one knows exactly when, but when he comes, he says it's going to be like some people are asleep. That they're just completely caught off guard unaware by his return. It's going to be like in the days of Noah, people are just going on with their lives, ignoring the warnings coming from the Prophet Noah until that day when the flood comes and just swept them all the way. And he says, "It's going to be like that. When I return some people are going to be caught off guard as if they were asleep. But others," Jesus said, "well, they're going to be wide awake. They're going to be ready, waiting for Jesus' return." And Jesus doesn't tell us exactly when he's going to return, but he does teach us how to be ready for his return. And that's what we're going to be focusing on today. Today as we've said, is Palm Sunday. In the passage that I just read, it comes from a larger passage of scripture that's often referred to as the Olivet Discourse. It's in Matthew chapter 24 through 25. And in Matthew's gospel, this is the sermon that Jesus preached on the Mount of Olives to his disciples sometime after his triumphal entry on Palm Sunday, but before his crucifixion on Good Friday. And there's way too much here for us to get through all of it verse by verse today. But we are going to get through most of it section by section. And as we do, we're going to be looking at five lessons, five steps that Jesus gives us that will enable us to be ready for his return, five areas that we need to endure in, in order to run this race and to finish well. And so the outline of today's sermon, Five steps to Finishing Well. The first step is to endure in hope. This is the beginning of Matthew chapter 24. Point two, endure in obedience. That's the end of chapter 24. Third, endure in faith. That's the beginning of chapter 25. Endure in mission. And then finally at the end of his sermon is the call to endure in love. Before we jump into the first point of today's sermon, would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? Father, we thank you that you are a good and a just God. That you will not tolerate sin and evil forever, that a day is coming when you will judge the world in righteousness, where all sin will be accounted for, either in hell for all of eternity as it deserves, or on the cross by Jesus Christ in our place. Jesus, we thank you for your sacrifice. We thank you for taking the punishment, the wrath that our sins deserve so that we can look to your coming, not with the fear of punishment, but with the hope of salvation, of deliverance. That you have saved us, you've justified us, you've saved us from the penalty of our sin, that you right now by the power of your Holy Spirit are saving us, delivering us from the power of sin in our lives. And that you will come again to once and for all time deliver us from the very presence of sin for all of eternity. We long for, we look to that day. And Lord, we pray as we do that you would give us the strength to endure. That by the power of your Holy Spirit we would persevere for the glory of your name. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. All right, point number one today is to endure in hope. And this comes from the beginning, Matthew chapter 24. Beginning in verse one, Matthew sets the context for us. He says that, "Jesus left the temple and was going away when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. But he answered them, 'You see these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.'" And then later, "As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, 'Tell us when these things will be? What will be the sign of your coming at the end of the age?' And Jesus answered them, see that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name saying, 'I am the Christ,' and they will lead many astray. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All of these are but the beginning of the birth pains. Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." And so Matthew begins, he sets the context for us. Jesus and his disciples, they're in Jerusalem and he begins to notice that his disciples are, they're starstruck by the impressive buildings, the stones of the temple. And he answers them. In verse three he says, "You see these things?" He says, "Listen to me. Truly, I say to you, there's not going to be one of these stones left on top of another. They're all going to be thrown down." And then his disciples come to in verse three and says, "Well, tell us Jesus, what are you talking about? When are these things going to happen? What are going to be the signs of your coming at the end of the age?" And then Jesus begins to answer their question. And as you read the next two chapters, it becomes clear that Jesus' answer is not so crystal clear. That he doesn't give him a straightforward, "Well, here's the time and here's the date." And actually what you see is that as he answers, he seems to be actually describing multiple different events all at the same time. Events that are distinct, but that are in some ways similar, some ways connected. On the one hand he's predicting the literal fall of Jerusalem. He's predicting the literal destruction of the temple, a prediction that actually came true within the lifetime of his own disciples. That happened, we know this from history. Now, on the other hand, when you look at the larger context of Matthew and especially the Gospel of John, we see that Jesus often compared the destruction of the temple to the destruction of his physical body, that he was foreshadowing his crucifixion and his resurrection. And this is why a few chapters later in Matthew 26, when Jesus is standing trial, well, some of his accusers come and say in Matthew 26:61 that, "This man said he was able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days." Well, we know Jesus actually did say something like that, but he wasn't referring to the literal temple at that time. He was talking about himself. That he was going to be crucified, buried, and that three days later he was going to rise from the death. Now, on the other hand, Jesus is clearly not just talking about himself. He's clearly not just talking about the temple, he's talking about the end of the world. And so he's preparing his disciples for God's judgment. He's preparing his disciples for the judgment of God that was going to be poured out on him later that week on the cross in their place for their sins. And he's also teaching them about the judgment of God that was going to fall on the whole temple system, that this was going to be a sign. That that old temple with its old, it wasn't needed anymore, because Jesus had come to fulfill all of that. Jesus was the true temple, the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit. And his disciples were as well as the Holy Spirit came to dwell in them and that they didn't need the priests and the sacrifices. Jesus was the high priest. Jesus was the sacrifice. But then thirdly, he's foreshadowing the judgment of God that was going to someday day come on all of creation. There was going to come a day when Jesus is going to return to judge the world in righteousness and to make all things new. And the apostle Peter later on in his life, he wrote in second Peter chapter three, remembering the words of Jesus. He quotes him in II Peter 3:10, "That the day of the Lord will come like a thief." And then he says, "The heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved and the earth and all the works that are done on it will be exposed." Nothing's going to be hidden from the judgment of God. And so verse 11 he says, "Since these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness in godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn. But what is our hope? Verse 13, "But according to his promise we are waiting for a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells." And this should cause the enemies of God to tremble in fear, to humble themselves and repent. But the reason that Jesus is telling his disciples this is because he wants them. He needs them to fix their eyes on this hope, because this hope is going to be the only thing that is going to allow them, enable them to persevere the tribulation that is about to come. And we need the hope of Jesus' return, because as we wait for his return, the truth is, things are going to get pretty bad. That before Jesus returns to rescue his church and lead us to glory, Satan is going to do everything he can to ravage the church and lead us astray. Jesus continues in verse four and he says, and so therefore he says, "See that no one leads you astray. For many are going to come into my name, saying, 'I am the Christ and they will lead many astray. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you're not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. And all of these are but the beginning of the birth pains. And then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.'" Jesus warns about three tactics that Satan, that the enemy is going to use, three categories of tribulation that he's going to wield against the church in order to lead us astray. In the first category we see. The first category of tribulation we see is that of trials. And what I mean by trials here, as Jesus talks about, there's going to be times of great difficulty. Wars, rumors of wars, famines, earthquakes, pestilence, disease, that he says, "There's going to be an increase in lawlessness. That it will just become common for people to lie, to cheat, to murder, to steal. And that these trials, they're going to be experienced, they're going to be common to everyone, but that Satan is going to use them in order to lead people astray. To lead people away from God, to lead them to extinguish their love, to grow cold in their love for God and their love for one another." And Jesus refers to these tribulations as birth pains. That they'll come and they'll go. They'll ebb and they'll flow throughout human history. And every time they do it's going to feel like the end of the world. It's going to feel like things couldn't possibly get any worse. And that these cycles of tribulation, they're going to come, they're going to continue until eventually a time of great tribulation, which the church will have to endure. But this will take place immediately before the return of Christ. It'll be painful, they'll be scary, but the hope is that these pains are leading to something glorious. And Jesus doesn't try to sugarcoat it. He says, "It's going to be bad." But he says in verse 13, "But listen, the one who endures to the end will be saved." And so in the trials of life, dear Christian, endure. The second category we see, the second category of tribulation is that of persecution. Verse nine, it says, "They will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another." Again, like the pangs of trials, persecutions, they come and go throughout church history and as they do, Jesus says, "They're going to cause some Christians to fall away, to turn against one another, to even hate one another." And I think a lot of people think that Christian persecution, oh, that's just something of the past. That's maybe something the early church experienced under the Roman Empire, but that doesn't happen today. Well, nothing could be further from the truth. It is estimated that since the dawn of the church, 70 million Christians have been martyred for their faith in Jesus Christ, 70 million. And over half of those took place within the last 100 years. And estimated around a 100,000 Christians are martyred every year, because they bear the name of Christ. And those of us who grew up here in America, we don't think about this often, because the world doesn't want to look at it. The world turns away from it, pretends like it's not happening. And much of it is happening far away on the other side of the world. I think a lot of Christians got a wake-up this week, these demonic evil attack that took place at the Covenant Christian School in Tennessee. It was a young woman who hated God, who hated Christians and targeted her rage at a Christian school. Satanically murdered three adults, three children, and I don't use that word satanic lightly. What is persecution? Persecution is what happens, when Satan tempts a person to love their sin and their perversion so much that they are willing to kill for it, rather than look to the one who loved them so much that he was willing to die for it, to die for them. It's demonic, it's evil, it's satanic and it's heart-wrenching when it hits so close to home. But this is a reality that many Christians throughout history and around the world today face every single day. This is the reality that got Jesus nailed to a cross. This is the reality that led every one of his apostles to a brutal martyr's death. That when the general calamity of the trials of life are not enough to pull us away, well then Satan is not above using specifically targeted evil at the people of God through the form of persecution. And sometimes it's social coercion, sometimes it's economic exclusion, sometimes it's threats and acts of violence. And Jesus warns us, verse nine, "They'll deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death and you'll be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another." Again, he doesn't sugar coat it for us, but he does leave us with this hope in verse 13, "That the one who endures to the end will be saved." So endure in trials, endure in persecution. The third category of tribulation we see in this passage is that of temptation. That Satan, look at verse 11, "Many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because of lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold." And then later in verse 24, he says, "For false christs and false prophets will arise and even perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect." Obviously, that's not possible, but he's trying to communicate how severe the temptation will be. That Satan doesn't always need to use persecution when sometimes all it takes is a little temptation. Sometimes all he needs to do is raise up a false prophet to tell us what we want to hear. Raise up a false pastor who instead of boldly preaching the truth that we need to hear will cower before the crowds and just tell them what they want to hear. This is, I mean these signs, they're everywhere. We see them all around us in this world today, the pains of labor. And when we feel them and when it feels like they've become too much, there's really two ways we can respond. We can look at this rising hatred of God, of persecution against Christians around the world. We can look at the cult of rampant perversion and sexual immorality that is domineering our culture. We can look at the wars, the rumors of wars, the famines, the disaster of the disease. We can look at the alarming apostacy in churches around us that scoff at the Word of God. We can look at these signs and lose heart. We can get discouraged, we can get angry. We can get bitter. We can allow our love to grow cold. We can believe the lie that these pains are just leading to a meaningless death. Or we can believe the truth, that these pains of labor will someday eventually give birth to eternal life, to new creation. And so dear Christian, endure the pains of this tribulation. Pick up your cross and fix your eyes on Jesus, the founder, the perfector of our faith who promises us Matthew 7:13, "That the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few." And then 24:13, "But the one who endures to the end will be saved." And finally, Matthew 24:32. Jesus gives us this beautiful illustration of hope, because after hearing all that, we need some hope. And this is what he says. He says, "From the fig tree learns its lesson, as soon as its branches become tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see all of these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates." I don't know about you, but I am ready for summer in more ways than one. Outside the front window of our apartment we have these two magnolia trees, and right now they look like death. They're barren. There's no leaves. They've got these ugly, fuzzy, grayish, greenish, brownish buds on the end of their branches. But when we see that ugliness, we get a little bit excited because we know what's about to come. We know it's only a matter of time before these buds start to bloom, before this barren tree begins to explode with color, with new life. And I really think this is just the providence of God. I looked out our window this morning and I can see just a few here there, 10, 11, maybe 12 of these buds beginning to open. The signs of life and color peeking through. Jesus may return in our lifetime, or he may not. We don't know the day or the hour. If he doesn't return soon, we have the promise of scripture that he is going to be with us. He will never leave us or forsake us. He will give us the power and the strength to persevere. And if he does return soon, he will do so in power and great glory to save and glorify his church and to put an end to Satan, sin, and death once and for all. In these last few verses of this first passage in verse 29, Jesus tells us, "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the heavens, and the powers of the heaven will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and all of the tribes of earth will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." And so first and foremost, in order to finish, well, we need to endure in this hope. And we see this here in this first section that we've looked at. But now as we look at the rest of Jesus' sermon throughout Matthew through chapter 24 and 25, what we see is that Jesus teaches a series of parables and each one of these shows us another step, another area that we will need to endure in order to finish well. And that we can endure in because of this hope that we have in Jesus Christ. And this really shows us practically what this is going to look like in day-to-day life. Point number one was, endure in hope. Point number two is verses 45 through 51 to endure in obedience. Jesus says in verse 44, "You must also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect." And then he begins to teach this parable. He says, "Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that wicked servant says to himself, 'My master is delayed,' and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him, at an hour that he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place that will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Parables are a lot like jokes. And I don't say that to say that this parable is funny. It's not. This is a very serious and grave warning that Jesus gives us. But they are in the sense that they're the closest, modern equivalent in the sense that a lot of the details in a parable are really meant to get you to the punchline of the parable. They're usually not meant to be read allegorically. They're meant to communicate one big idea, one big aha moment. As we read these parables, we got to ask, "What is the punchline of this parable?" And the punchline of this one Jesus is teaching us is, don't be like this wasted servant living a wasted life. In other words, you need to live every day as if it were your last because it very well could be so. That there is an urgency to our obedience to Christ. And the reason that there is an urgency to obedience is because we all have this tendency to want to put it off, to get to it later. How many of us have been in that place in life where we tell ourselves, "I want to follow Jesus, but I'll get serious and really give him my full obedience someday, later. I just got some stuff I want to do first." I've been there. I was that stereotypical church kid that went off to college and drifted away. And you know this about me, my first semester I joined a band and on the weekends, I wasn't going to church on the weekends, we were driving all over the Midwest, touring, playing shows. And I remember one spring morning we were on some college campus, we'd been up late playing a show the night before. And I don't know, we got up at the crack of like 10:30 or 11:00 and decided to go out and try to find something to eat. As we were driving through town, I see this woman, she's got a nice dress on, she's got a big fancy hat. She's walking down the street by herself waving a palm branch. I was like, "What on earth is she doing?" And then suddenly it dawned on me it was Sunday, today was Palm Sunday. I'd considered myself a Christian, and yet it had been so long since I thought about God or I thought about church, I didn't even realize the season, that Easter was just a week away. I was oblivious. I was like the hypocrite in this parable. And if you're waiting until later to give your full obedience to Christ, that's a really dangerous game to play. Later may never come. And if it does, you might not have the heart to respond when it does. Hebrews three warns us. Hebrews 3:12. It says, "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have come to share in Christ if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end." And so endure in obedience so that you may not be hardened by deceitfulness of sin. That's point two. Point three is to endure in faith. And this is the beginning of the next chapter, chapter 25:1-13. Jesus tells us another parable. He says, "Then the kingdom of heaven will be like 10 virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bride groom. Five of them were foolish and five of them were wise. And when the foolish ones took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wises took flasks of oil with their lamps. As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, 'Here's the bridegroom. Come out to meet him.' Then all those virgins rose, trimmed their lamps. And the foolish ones said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' But the wise answered saying, 'Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.' And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. And afterward the other virgins also came saying, 'Lord, Lord, open to us.' But he answered, 'Truly, I say to you, 'I do not know you.' Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.'" So again, we got, this is not an allegory, it's a parable, so the punchline here is, does Jesus know you? He answers the foolish and he says, "Truly I say to you, I do not know you." And this is echoing a statement that he made in the Sermon of the Mount earlier in Matthew chapter seven. He says, "Listen, not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord', will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. And on that day, many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you, depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'" When Jesus returns, he's not going to be impressed with our self-righteous list of accomplishments as we stand before his throne in judgment. The question is, does he know you? Do you have faith? Do you have a relationship with Jesus Christ? Oftentimes we're tempted to put off our obedience to Christ. Well, oftentimes we're often tempted to put off our relationship with Jesus Christ to say, "I'll get serious about my faith later. I'll spend time in fasting and prayer. I'll start to read my Bible later. Someday when I'm less busy, someday when I have more time." Well, later may never come. And the question is, Jesus wants us to feel an urgency that if he came back today, would it be like you're meeting a stranger, or would it be like you're meeting a friend, somebody that you know, someone you have a relationship with? You need to endure in faith. Point number four is to endure in mission. This is verse 14 through 30, Matthew chapter 25. This is the parable of the talents. And we looked at this last week, so I'm not going to read through the whole thing again for us this week, just to give you the CliffsNotes version, the parable of the talents that there's a wealthy master, a wealthy king. He's entrusted three of his servants with a certain amount of money, with a certain number of talents to invest as he departs and goes on a long journey. And then he comes back to settle accounts with them after a long time. And what we're told is that the wicked servant, he took his master's money, he hid it, he buried it in the ground, and when the master comes back he punishes him. But the good servants, they took their master's talents, they invested them faithfully. And when the master comes back, he says to them in verse 23, "Well done, good and faithful servant. You've been faithful over a little, I'll set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master." And last week when we looked at this parable, we looked at it through the lens of giving and generosity. And that's, I think a good way to look at it. It's one of the ways that you can look at it. But ultimately, Jesus was talking about a lot more than just managing money when he was teaching this parable. He wants us, we need to look at this through the lens of God's mission that Jesus is teaching about the Kingdom of God. Now, Jesus is the master, right? He's gone on a long journey. He's ascended into heaven. We don't know the day that he's going to return, but we know that when he does return that he will be back. And while he is gone, he has left us with a mission to accomplish. If you remember back in Matthew 24:14, Jesus tells us this, "That this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." We all love this idea of doing evangelism, of making disciples, of answering God's calling for our life, investing our talents for his kingdom. But so often we are not doing those things now, because again, we keep saying, "Oh, well, I'll do those things someday later." And what we're doing in those moments is we're really acting like the foolish, like the wicked servant. Were burying God's talents in the ground. And Matthew 9:57 we're told that as Jesus and his disciples were going along the road, someone came and he said to him, "Hey Jesus, I'll follow you wherever you go.' And Jesus said to him, "Well, foxes have holes in birds of the airs have nests. But the son of man has nowhere to lay his head." And to another he said, "Follow me." But he said, "Well, Lord, let me first go and bury my father." And Jesus said to him, "Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God." And yet another said, "I will follow you, Lord, but first let me say farewell to those at my home." And Jesus said to him, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God." And obviously Jesus is using a bit of hyperbole here, but the point is clear, that the mission doesn't start tomorrow, the mission starts today. That we cannot put this off. We need to go, proclaim the kingdom of God, keep both hands to the plow and not look back. We need to endure in this mission. And then finally, we're called, at the end of his sermon Jesus calls us to endure in love. That is point number five, Matthew 25:31-46. But first, if you remember back to the beginning of chapter 24, Jesus warned us about this. He said, "That many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold." That we need as the church to endure and love. We need to endure in our love for God, we need to endure and our love for our neighbors, for people in general. But at the end of his sermon here, Jesus gives us a parable in which he is calling us specifically to endure in our love for one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. This is the meaning of the final parable. This is the parable of the sheep and the goats. Matthew 25:31. Jesus says, "When the son of man comes in his glory and all of the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. And before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on his left and then the king will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me in. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison and you came to me." Then the righteous will answer him saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you a drink? When did we see you as stranger and welcome, or you are naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?" And the king will answer them, "Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these, my brothers, you did it to me." And then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink. I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, I was naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me." Then they will also answer saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and not minister to you?" Then he'll answer them saying, "Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me. And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." And I think most of us, at least for myself, whenever I've heard this read or preached, it's usually preached in the sense of, this is a call for Christians to do good works. This is a call for Christians to be charitable and compassionate and to care for those are who are in need. And those are certainly all good things that Christians should do. But that's not the point of what Jesus is talking about here. Because again, so the parable, it's not an allegory. And so what it is the punchline of the parable, it's verse 40, "That the king will answer them, 'Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of," the least of who? "One of the these, my brothers, you did it for me." And when you read the gospels, when Jesus uses that language of the least of these, when he uses the language of my brothers and sisters, he's referring to his disciples. That as Christians we should love our neighbors as ourselves, that we should be charitable and compassionate to people in general. But the big idea that Jesus is talking about here is that this needs to be especially true for how we love and care for our brothers and sisters in Christ. That as Christians, when we love other Christians, when we care for the body of Christ, it says, "If we are caring for Christ himself." And when we don't, we see the warning there as well. Now, we need to think about this in the context of the sermon that Jesus is preaching. Jesus is preaching to a people who are about to face tribulation. And in just a few days he's going to lead the way by going to the cross himself. And I think part of what's going on here is that Jesus is, he's foreshadowing the reality that a time of difficulty was about to come for himself, that he would be crucified, and that when he was his followers, his disciples, his brothers and sisters would be tempted to desert him, to betray, to deny, to be ashamed to associate with him. And that's exactly what happened. But he's also saying, "That a time of difficulty is coming for you, my church as well. And when it does, you're going to be tempted to do the same, to turn against and to abandon one another." And he's reminding us that in those moments when it becomes the most costly, the most inconvenient to love one another, that is precisely when we need to love one another the most. And we have a very direct example of this in the New Testament. In II Timothy chapter one. The apostle Paul writes in second Timothy 1:15, he says to Timothy, "Listen, you are aware of all of those in Asia who turned away from me, among whom were Phygelus and Hermogenes. May the Lord grant mercy to the house of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. But when he arrived in Rome, he searched for me earnestly and found me. May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that day." And so he says, you remember Phygelus and Hermogenes, right? Phygelus, goat, Hermogenes, goat. They're hypocrites. They claim to be followers of Jesus, but they were fakes, they were frauds. When it came time to prove their faith, they were ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ. They turned and they abandoned the apostle Paul. Onesiphorus, now there's a sheep, right? He cared for Paul while he was in prison. He wasn't ashamed to go to him and give him help in his time of need. He's the real goat in the modern sense, not to get too confusing. But you see what's going on here. He cared for Paul. And in caring for Paul, it's as if he cared for Christ. And look at what Paul prays for him in verse 18. He says, "May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that day." On what day? On the day when Jesus comes to separate the sheep from the goats. That as the church we must endure for love and love for one another always, especially when it's hard, especially when it's costly, especially when the world around us hates us. By doing so, we honor Christ and we prove, we test testify to the world that we truly are his disciples. And Jesus, in John 13:34, he tell his disciples, "A new commandment I give to you that you love one another, just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another." And he says, "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have loved one another." And so the five steps to finish well, endure in hope, endure in obedience, endure in faith, endure in mission, endure in love. And Jesus gave this last commandment that we just read. If you remember this, he gave this in the context of the Last Supper, right after having washed his disciples' feet. It says John 13:12. It says, "When he had washed their feet and he put on his outer garment and resumed his place, and he said to them, 'Do you understand what I've done for you? You call me teacher and Lord, and you're right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I've given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed you if you do them, I'm not speaking of all of you, I know whom I have chosen, but the scripture will be fulfilled. He who ate bread has lifted his heel against me.'" He's talking about Judas who would betray him. "But I'm telling you this now before it takes place, that when it does take place, you may believe that I am he, truly, truly, I say to you, whoever receives the one I send receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me." Today is a special day, today is Palm Sunday. It's the beginning of Holy Week and it's fitting that we look to the return of Christ on the day that he first entered, his triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Today is also Communion Sunday, we remember the crowd that cried, hosanna, that welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem as their savior. We also remember that crowd quickly turned into the mob that later that week rejected him as their Lord. And their response, it stands as a warning, as a reminder throughout the ages that our greatest need is not for a savior who is going to come and save us from our circumstances. Our greatest need is for a savior who's going to come and save us from ourselves, save us from our sin, our guilt, our shame from the wrath of God that those things deserve. And communion is a time for us to remember and to give thanks and to celebrate that Jesus Christ came to do just that. Jesus died on the cross to deliver us from the penalty that our sin deserved. That Jesus rose from the grave to deliver us from the power of sin over our lives. And that Jesus is going to come again to judge the living and the dead, and to deliver us from the very presence of sin, a once and for all and for all eternity. God, we thank you for your amazing grace. We thank you that the signs are all around us, that the winter is almost over, that spring and summer are almost here. And that when we see these signs, we know for certain that you are with us. You have promised to be with us always to the very end of the age. And whether that day be soon, or whether that day be long beyond our time here on earth. Lord, I pray that you'd give us the grace and the power to walk faithfully and endure to the end for the sake of your name and glory. That every one of our lives would be used as a witness, as a testimony to your goodness, to your grace, to your power, to your glory. And we thank you for the blood of your son, Jesus Christ that was poured out for us, so that we could be forgiven, so that we could be redeemed from our slavery to sin and adopted into your household as sons and daughters. And we come now as your children and just continue to give you thanks and give you our praise. In Jesus' name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Committed to Generosity

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 26, 2023 44:39


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. We are continuing today in our sermon series Committed Talking about Essential Habits of abundant Life. If you have your Bibles open up to 2 Corinthians 9, that's we're going to be spending most of our time today. And if you haven't been with us, what we've been doing throughout this series, we are about 10 weeks in. We got two weeks to go. Next week's going to be the conclusion of this series. We've been talking about the essential, non-negotiable, super practical commitments that we all need to make as followers of Jesus in order to grow and persevere in our faith and in order to experience the abundant life that he calls every one of us to. And we've covered a lot of ground in this series, talked about a lot of topics. And the topic that we're going to be talking about today is we're going to be talking about money. We're going to be talking about generosity. We're going to be talking about giving every pastor's favorite thing to talk about. Actually, a lot of pastors are uncomfortable talking about this. And really I think a lot of the reason is because we've seen it done so poorly. Especially you think about Christian television, these guy, they're practically like charlatans, pedaling the gospel for financial gain. And that's not what this is about. And so just right up front in case you're worried, I do not live in a mansion. I have a nice apartment in Brooklyn. I do not fly in a private jet, but I do have a pretty nice Mazda. I'm proud of that. But I'm not after your money. I don't need your money. God doesn't need your money, right? That's not what this is about. Psalm 50, God tells us, he says, "Listen, every beast of the forest is mine. The cattle on a thousand hills, they're mine. I know all the birds of the hills and all that moves in the field is mine. If I were hungry, would I not tell you? For the world and its fullness are mine." He says. And God's not lacking in anything. He doesn't need anything. He made it all. He owns it all. But the reason that we're talking about money today is because as much as God doesn't need our money, he does desire our maturity and how we relate to money is going to be one of the single most, the greatest contributing factors to that, to our spiritual health, our growth, and our maturity. Because we live in a world that worships money, that is obsessed with money. And every single one of us, we are either going to worship money as well or we are going to learn how to worship with our money, but we can't do both. And Jesus, he made this clear in Matthew 6:19. He said, "Remember, do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy, where thieves breaking and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither rust nor moth destroy where these do not breaking and steal for where your treasure is there, your heart will be also." And then he goes on though in verse 24, he says, "Listen, no one can serve two masters. He will either hate the one and love the other or be devoted to the one and despise the other, but you cannot serve both God and money." And so we need to see money as what it is. Money's a tool and it's a powerful tool. But if we fail to learn how to use it properly, it will slowly begin to use us. It will take us captive and enslave us. And there's danger here. The apostle Paul writing to Timothy in 1 Timothy 6 he warned him about this. He said, first of all, verse six, he says, "Godliness with contentment, that's great gain for we brought nothing into the world and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing with these we'll be content." But he says, "Those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction for the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. And through this craving, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs." There's a warning there. But we also need to look carefully at this because this verse 10 it's up there in the list of probably the top most misquoted verses in all of scripture. Because usually when you hear this verse, you hear it said that "Money is the root of all evil." But that's not what it says. It says that the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. The money itself is not the problem. The problem is how we use it and how we use it can be either to produce great good or to cause great evil. And this is why when you look at the gospels, Jesus talks about money all the time. Actually, he talks about money more than just about anything else. Over half of his parables had to do with how we manage money. He talked about it all the time. And so we need to talk about it as well. And so that's what we're going to be talking about today. And so we're in 2 Corinthians 9 and I believe this gives us one of the most straightforward, clear, practical teachings and scripture about giving about Christian and generosity. And so we're going to just work through this verse by verse. And as we do, we're going to be looking at seven principles of godly giving the apostle Paul teaches us this passage is packed with application. And so we're going to be looking at these seven principles. We're going to move through them pretty quickly. And the big hope, the idea is we want to learn how to wield our wealth as generous stewards and use these things for God's glory. And so 2 Corinthians 9, beginning in verse six, the apostle Paul writes this. He says, "This is the point. Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. And whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion. For God loves a cheerful giver and God is able to make all grace abound to you so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work as it is written, he is distributed freely. "He's given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way, to be generous, in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. For the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many Thanksgivings to God. By their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ and the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others while they long for you and pray for you because of the surpassing grace of God upon you. Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift." This is the reading of God's word for us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer for our sermons day? And God, we do give you thanks for this inexpressible gift that you have given us life. You have given us your word. And Lord importantly, you have given us your son Jesus Christ to pay our debt and to supply our every need to be completely sufficient in every way. And Lord, help us to know, to trust and to see you for who you really are, that you are our gracious and generous father and we ask that you would teach us as your children to live in that grace and to live lives of grace and generosity as well. And I pray this for your glory and we pray this in the name of your son Jesus Christ. Amen. All right, so we're looking at seven lessons, seven principles of godly giving today. And the very first one we see in verse six. And Paul starts out just plain and simple. He says, "The point is this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. Whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully." And the first principle that we see is that as Christians we need to get beyond this view that giving is this drudgery, this obligation that we're all bound to and actually start to see it for what it really is, which is it is an incredible opportunity to invest what God has entrusted with us, with the expectation that there will be a reward, there will be a return. The first principle is that giving is an investment opportunity. That God is not the IRS, he is not taxing you on what is rightfully yours. God is your father and he is entrusting you with what is actually rightfully his. Everything you have it's a gift from the father's hand. And he doesn't give us these things just to hoard them for ourselves. He wants us to experience the freedom and the joy of using them, of investing them to bless others, to bless God, to seek his kingdom and invest in his kingdom pulses. "So therefore, if you sow bountifully, don't worry, you will also reap bountifully." In Matthew chapter 25, Jesus teaches one of his most famous parables on this very subject. And it's a little bit long, but I'm going to read the whole thing cause this is extremely important. This is the parable of the talents. Matthew 25:14. Jesus teaching his disciples about the kingdom of God and he says "It's going to be like a man who's going on a journey." "He calls his servants and he entrusted to them his property to one, he gave five talents to another two and to another one each according to his ability. And then he went away. "He had received the five talents, went at once and traded with them and he made five talents more. So also he had the two talents, made two talents more, but he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and he hid his master's money. Now after a long time, the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them and he had received the five talents, came forward bringing five talents, more saying, "Master, you delivered to me five talents here I've made you five talents more." And his master said to him, "Well done, good and faithful servant, you have been faithful over a little. I will set you over much, enter into the joy of your master." And he also who had the two talents came forward saying, "Master, I delivered to you. You delivered to me two talents. Here I've made two talents more." "And his master said to him, "Well done, good and faithful servant, you've been faithful over a little. I will set you over much enter into the joy of your master." He also had received the one talent came forward saying, "Master, I knew you to be a hard man reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you scattered no seeds. So I was afraid and I went and I hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours." His master answered him "You wicked and slothful servant. You knew that I reap where I've not sewn and gather where I scattered no seed, then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers I might coming, I should have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him and give it to the one who has 10 talents for to everyone who has more be given and he will have an abundance, but from the one who is not even what he has will be taken away and cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."" And one of the things that we're meant to do as we read this parable is notice the dichotomies that are going on that in this parable what we see are two very different types of servants, two different categories of servant. We have two very different destinations, but we also see two very different perceptions of the master. And that what separates the good and the faithful from the wicked and the lazy servant in this parable is not just that the good servants go and they invest the talents that the master gave them. What really separates them is this perception of who the master was, that the good servants were willing to invest their talents to go immediately, to go quickly because they understood that the master was a very joyful and generous guy. Now the wicked servant, he didn't see that. He didn't know the master clearly. The wicked servant believed that the master was cruel and corrupt. And so he hides his talent out of fear and he wasn't willing to take any risks to make any investments with what he had because he was afraid. He's afraid that the master was cruel and that if he made a mistake, if he didn't get a good return, that the master would punish him for that. But that that's not the kind of guy that the master was. The good servants they understood this, that the master wasn't cruel, the master wasn't unjust, he was kind, he was joyful, he was generous. And then all he was really asking them to do was to take what he had entrusted them with and go out, take a risk and invest it. And we see that when the master returns, notice that he doesn't praise them for their success. Primarily what he praises them for is their faithfulness. He says, "Well done, my good and faithful servant, you've been faithful over what" he says, "a talent" and the master says "is a little." And then from the master's perspective, apparently a talent was just a small amount, but to the average person, a talent represented like 20 years of wages. For the average person, five talents was more money than they would see in their lifetime. And yet to the master, he says, "I was just trusting you with a little and you were faithful with that." And the big idea is that how you give is ultimately a reflection of how you view God. And if you view God as stingy, as cruel, as withholding, as unjust, if you believe that God's provision is scarce, then yeah, you're going to live in fear. You're going to be afraid to take risks. You're going to be afraid to invest what he has given you. You're going to be afraid that God won't take care of you. If on the other hand you understand that God is a good father, that his resources are limitless, that as we read that creation and all the fullness thereof, that's all his. He has everything he needs, he's never going to run out. Well then you, you're set free as the good servants were to just go at once without hesitation and invest what he is giving you to invest because ultimately at the end of the day, the father's not looking for our ROI. What he's looking for is our faithfulness. He says, "Well done, good and faithful servant." The question is, "Do you trust me and are you willing to do what I say even in when that involves risk and sacrifice," and how you answer that question, it's dependent on how you view God. And so guys, the master in the parable says, "You were faithful over a little and I put you over much. You were faithful over a little. Enter and experience the joy of your master." Luke 6:38. Jesus says, "Give and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together. Running over will be put in your lap for with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you." And so the first principle is we need to stop viewing giving as this taxing obligation and begin to see it as the opportunity that it is, an opportunity to take what God has given us and invest it for his kingdom, for his glory. The second principle we see is that giving is a matter of the heart. Paul says that whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. Whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. And then in verse 7, he says, "And each one must give as he is decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion for God loves a cheerful giver." And so he says, "You got to give as you've decided in your heart." But then he also gives us the filter of how you reach that decision. How do you decide in your heart what to give? Well, he tells us. And if you were here a couple weeks ago we talked about the Venn diagram of discernment, of how you discern God's calling God's will for you. Well, this verse here, it's kind of like the Venn diagram of giving. How do you decide in your heart how much to give? And we see these three circles in the text and you're looking for the sweet spot again in the middle. And the first circle that we see is the first verse that we read that God calls us to give bountifully, to give generously, even to give sacrificially. And the illustration that he uses is that of a farmer planting seed. Like the farmer has a decision. The farmer can hoard everything, keep it for himself and use it, eat all of the grain, all of the seed that he sort. Or he can deny himself a portion of that in order to plant with the idea that the more you plant, the more you sew, the more you will eventually reap. And so practically, when it comes to deciding how much you should give, particularly we're talking about giving to church, tithes, offerings, things like that. But also generally how do we give when God provides us opportunities to live generously with The principle is that you should be giving enough that it actually feels like a sacrifice. That in order to give bountifully, well that means you got to be able to deny yourself right now, like deny yourself certain comforts, certain luxuries that you need to decisively live below your means in order that you may be have that margin in your budget to give to God and to be generous with others. And in the Old Testament, the principle, it began with it, the idea of the tithe, remember this, that God's people were called to give 10% of all that they had back to God as a worship offering. And in the New Testament, Jesus actually he affirms and he assumes the tithe is a good thing, something that his followers will do as well. We see this in Luke chapter 11. We see this in Matthew 23:23. Jesus is addressing the problems with the Pharisees. And he says to them, he says, "Whoa to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. For, you tithe mint and dill and cumin." He's talking about you. You tie even the most minute things in your life, making sure that you give precisely 10% of everything. But he says, "But you neglect the way your matters of the law, justice, mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done." Yeah, you ought to have tithed, "But without neglecting the others, you blind guides, you're straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel." So the Pharisees, they thought they were like hot stuff. They thought they were really flexing by how precisely they ties on everything that they had. But Jesus says, "I'm not impressed." You might be trying to impress others, but you're doing this and you're doing it for the wrong reason. And Jesus says he's not impressed. Yeah, you should have been tithing, but more importantly, you should be faithful. You should be, be merciful. In other words, you should be living beyond the letter of the law in order to fulfill the spirit of the law, in order to be people who's who are living radically sacrificial lives of generosity, both in their tithes and offerings to God, but also with how they, they're generous with their entirety of their lives. Are you generous with your time? Are you generous with your talents, your skills, your ability? Are you generous with your talents, your treasures, your material possessions? And so as we try to decide in our hearts what to give, the first question is, am I truly sacrificing? Am I sowing bountifully? Or if I'm honest with myself, am I just kind of serving up my leftovers to God? Like the things that I wouldn't miss if they were gone anyway? Well, scripture calls us to give sacrificially. C.S. Lewis in mere Christianity. He said, "I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I'm afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare." In other words, if our expenditures on comforts, luxuries, amusements, et cetera, if that is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, well we're probably giving away too little. If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small, there ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charitable expenditures exclude them. And so that, that's the first circle. But then Paul goes on, he tells us the other two, which are also important as well. In verse seven he says, "You also, you must give as you've decided, your heart give not reluctantly or under compulsion and cheerfully for God loves a cheerful giver." So give it cheerfully, joyfully, not under compulsion and not begrudgingly and sacrificially as well. And the only way that you can find that sweet spot in the middle and be able to do all that is when you understand that your giving is a response to just the incredible, abundant, overwhelming generosity that God has already shown us in his son Jesus Christ. And so personally, just practically, this is what I do, this is what I think I would recommend all Christians do in our household, Kelly and I, every year or any time that our household income changes, we sit down and we update our budget. And the way that we budget our household budget is we figure out our income and then before anything else first, foremost, before rents, before taxes, before Uncle Sam gets his hands on a single penny of that income, we block out, we are giving our tithe that at least 10% of that is going straight to our local church to Mosaic. That is our offering to God. It's an act of worship. But then beyond that, you build the whole rest of your budget with that idea in mind of like, we need to leave space, we need to leave margin, we need to cut things out, luxuries, comforts that maybe we would like to have but don't need to have. So that we have that space there to be generous when God presents us opportunities to be generous and to do so knowing that Jesus taught us it is more blessed to give than to receive. And so this is not easy to do, especially if you've never done this before. This can be hard. It can be scary to really trust God and to commit to do this. And I think that's why the next principle that we see in our text is that giving is not only a matter of heart giving is also an act of faith. Giving is an act of demonstrating what we truly believe, that at the end of the day that God is the one who cares for us. He is the one who PR has provided for us and that he will be faithful. Paul says verse seven, each one us give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And then consider these next few verses carefully, verse 8. "And God is able to make all grace abound to you so that having all sufficiency and all things at all times you may abound in every good work as it is written, he has distributed freely his given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever and he who supplies seed to the sower and bred for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. And the question here is at the end of the day, do we really believe this? Do we really trust that God will take care of us or are we putting our trust in our own ability to take care of ourselves, our own ability to produce wealth? Jesus, he also taught a parable about this in Luke 12, which told in verse 13 that someone in the crowd came up to him and said, "Hey teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me." And he said to him, "Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?" And he said to them, "Take care and be on your guard against all covetousness for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions." And he told them a parable saying "The land of a rich man produced plentifully. And he thought to himself, "What shall I do for I have nowhere to store my crops?" And he said, "I'll do this, I'll tear down my barns and build larger ones. And there I will store all my grain and my goods and I will say to my soul, soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years. Relax, eat, drink, be merry." But God said to him, "Fool. This night your soul is required of you and the things that you've prepared, whose will they be?" So is the one who lays up treasures for himself and is not rich toward God."" And when we are rich toward God, ultimately what we're doing is we're demonstrating that we trust that God is our provision. And that also means that we're not trusting ourselves to be that provision ultimately. And I don't think it's a coincidence that therefore the very next thing that Jesus begins to talk about with the people listening is their anxiety, their anxieties about the things of life every day, things that average people worry about when it comes to money. But we go on and you read in verse 22, he addressing these anxieties and he does so by offering just some of the most comforting words that we have in all of scripture. And so it says that, "He says then to his disciples, "Therefore I tell you in light of everything we just said in light of this call that I've given you to live richly toward God," He says, "I tell you, do not be anxious about your life. What you eat nor about your body, what you will put on life is more than food in the body is more than clothing." "He says, "Consider the ravens. They neither sew nor reef. They have neither storehouse nor barn and yet God feeds them of how much more value are you than the birds? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour or to a span of life if then you are not able to do as smaller thing as that? Are you anxious about the rest? Consider the lilies how they grow. They neither toil nor spin yet I tell you, even Solomon in all of his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothed the grass which is alive in the field today and tomorrow's thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, oh you of little faith." "You're not seek what you are to eat what you're to drink nor be worried for all the nations of the world seek after these things and your father knows that you need them. Instead, seek his kingdom. And these things will be added to you. Fear not little flock for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom, sell your possessions and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with money bags that do not grow old with treasures in heaven that do not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys for where your treasure is there, your heart will be also." So how is your anxiety level right now, particularly when you think about money, when you think about these cares that we all have? Well, scripture consistently draws a connection between our level of anxiety and our level of faith that Romans 8:15 it says, "You did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear. You received the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, Abba, Father." That God doesn't call us to live an anxiety and fear as if we were orphans, as if we were slaves. He calls us to live as sons and daughters of the king in that safety, in that security. And what this means is that that for the Christian anxiety, it's based on delusion, illusion, it's based on deception. It's a lie of the enemy telling us that God is not good, that he is not our father, that he is not going to keep his promises, he's not going to take care of us. And the only way we overcome that is through the eyes of faith. It's through the eyes of trusting and seeing God for who he really is and that ultimately our lives are safe in the father's hands, Paul talks about this in 1 Timothy 6. He's again teaching Timothy and he says, "As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share. Thus storing up treasures for themselves as a good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of that which is truly life." That when you see reality for what it really is, when you see God for who he really, that's how you take hold of that which is truly life to not live basing your life in the uncertainty and the anxiety of earthly riches, but resting in the security of your father who as Paul says, richly provides us with everything to enjoy. So giving is an act of faith. Fourth, we see giving. Giving is also a catalyst for spiritual growth. It's a means of growing our faith. Paul continues, verse 10. He says, "He who supplies seed to the sewer and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You'll be enriched in every way to be generous, in every way, which through us will produce thanks giving to God." And what we see is that not only is giving an act of faith, it is also a means of growing in our faith that as we sow the seed the father entrust to us, Paul says we will be enriched in every way that we will reap a harvest of righteousness. Most of us know this, that scripture tells us to not put the Lord our God to the test. But there is actually one place in scripture where God commands us to test him, where he invites us to test him in something. And it has to do with this topic of giving ex. This comes from Malachi chapter 3:7. God is talking to his people Israel and he tells them, "From the days of your fathers, you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them." And he invites them, "Return to me and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. But you say, "How shall we return?"" And then God asks them this question. He says, "Well man, Rob God, yet you are robbing me. You say, "How have we robbed you?" Well in your tithes and contributions, your curse with a curse for you robbing me, the whole nation of you. Bring the full tithe into the storehouse that there may be food in my house and thereby put me to the test," says the Lord of hosts. "If I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need, I will rebuke the devour for you so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil and the vine and your field shall not fail to bears as the Lord of hosts." And then verse 12 says, "And then all nations will call you blessed for you will be a land of delights," says the Lord of hosts." I remember the first time that I read this, the first time I heard this scripture, Kelly and I, we were newlyweds, we were baby Christians and we saw this and we're like, "We don't want to miss out on this. So we're going to do this. We're going to make the decision to start tithing as a family as a couple." Now at the time I was pulling in about $25,000 a year as a entry level graphic designer. Kelly on the other hand, she was pulling in negative dollars a year as a college student. And so things were pretty tight for us. We were getting by on chicken nuggets and fish sticks from Walmart. But we were like, we read this and we're like, "We trust God. We're going to do this. We're going to put God to the test." And so we did. And what we found is that he proved himself overwhelmingly, abundantly, faithful, not just then, but every day since then. And as we saw God's faithfulness, God's provision over and over and over, well as we saw all these examples of God being faithful to us, our faith itself grew in tandem. We were given so many opportunities to grow in our faith because of witnessing his faithfulness to us. And so giving can be a catalyst for spiritual growth. And fifth is that giving is a blessing to the church. Paul says in verse 12, "The ministry of the service," he's talking about their the church's giving. He says, "The ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many thanks givings to God." And I love this because even just thinking back over the last year, we can see clearly that Mosaic, the ministry of your service, of your giving, it has supplied the needs of the saints. And it has resulted in an overflown in many Thanksgivings to God. If you don't know this Mosaic, we as a church, we tithe. And so what that means is that 90% of everything that we take in is used for the work of the ministry here in Boston to be a blessing to the saints here so that we can be a blessing to the city. It covers the cost of doing ministry and a really crazy expensive place like this. But the other 10%, at least 10% as an organization, we send that out to be a blessing to saints all over the world. And so last year we were actually able to go above and beyond that. Last year we were able to give around $220,000. And just to break it down about 80,000 of that we were able to raise through the Ukraine fund, which directly every dollar. Well that went to support a ministry in the Ukraine that was caring for orphans, refugees. In addition to that, another $40,000 was sent to basically fund a brand new church plant in Ukraine through that same organization. And then the remaining $100,000 was used to support church planting efforts here in Boston, new England, north America, all over the world. And so I say that just to say praise God for Mosaic's generosity like this is so encouraging. It's a blessing to us to be able to see how God uses this. And it's a blessing to saints all over the world that results in thankfulness of God. And I want to thank you, I want to encourage you in that. And then I also want to stir you up and challenge you because I think as a church that we can do more that we've been faithful over little, God wants to put us over more. The last statistic I saw reported that the average Christian in America only gives about 2% of their income away. By God's grace we can estimate the average a tender at Mosaic gives around 3%. So we're above average, but there's room to grow. Imagine, just imagine what we could do if even just the members of Mosaic started to bring in the full ti as Malachi said. Malachi says, verse 10, "Bring the full tithe into the storehouse that there may be food in my house and thereby put me to the test as the Lord if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need." And then he says, "And when you do this that all the nations will call you blessed and you will be a land of delights." And somewhere around 2 billion Christians in the world today, imagine if they all tithed. Imagine if it started with us. Imagine like the work that we could do, the blessing that we could be, the reward that we could expect if we stepped up as a church to go against the odds, to go against the norm and prove to be faithful over however little, however much God entrusts with us. Imagine the thanksgiving and the glory that could be given to God as we grow together in this area. And that really leads us to point number six, that not only is giving a blessing to the saints, a blessing to the church that giving is also a blessing to God. And we see this throughout the text. Verse 11 says, "You will be enriched in every way to be generous, in every way, which through us produces thanks giving to God for the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many thanks givings to God. And by their approval of this service, they will glorify God." I'm not going to say a whole bunch about this because it's pretty self-explanatory, but this is really the greatest benefit of giving that people get to see through us, that as Christians, as we live generously, people get to see a reflection of God through us. They get a picture of what God is really like, that God is generous, he is gracious, and he is trustworthy. And this results, thanks giving results in him receiving the glory that He deserves. And then finally point number seven is that giving is the natural response to God's grace. 2 Corinthians 9:13, Paul says, "By their approval of the service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ and the generosity of your contribution for them and for all the others while they long for you and pray for you because of the surpassing grace of God upon you. Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift." And this is ultimately what motivates it all. This is what's at the heart of it all, that we give God our first and our best and we do so joyfully because God gave us His first. He gave us His best, that God's greatest gift, this inexpressible gift, it's not money, it's not possessions, it's not treasures here on earth that God went so far beyond that, that God gave the very treasure of heaven itself, his son, Jesus Christ, to come and to secure our salvation, to secure our eternity. John 3:16 says "That for God so loved the world that He gave His only son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life." And once you've received this gift, you clinging to it for dear life. And as you clinging to this gift, this is what sets you free and enables you to hold everything else in life loosely, to hold the treasures of this world loosely and to give the treasures of this world freely knowing that you are merely giving freely of what you cannot keep. And knowing that you have found the one treasure that you can never lose, the treasure that itself has taken hold of you in Christ Jesus. I'm going to close this morning by reading from Philippians 4 because this is just a great example of getting to see this played out in real life and the relationship between the apostle Paul and the Philippian church that throughout Paul's life, the Philippian Church was a church that brought him a great deal of joy. And it was a church that faithfully throughout the years supported him financially in the work of his ministry. And he writes to them towards the end of his life to thank them and to remind them of this partnership. And he says in verse 10, he says, "I rejoice in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me. You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity to show it. And it's not that I'm speaking of being in need for, I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance I've learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Yet it was kind of you to share my trouble." "And you Philippians yourselves know that in the beginning of the gospel when I left Macedonia, no church entered into partnership with me in giving and receiving except only you. Even in Thessalonica, you sent me hope for my needs once and again. And it's not that I seek the gift, but I seek the fruit that increases to your credit, I have received full payment and more, I am well supplied having received from Epaphroditus, the gift you sent, a fragrant offering, a sacrifice, acceptable and pleasing to God. And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus, to our God and Father, be glory forever and ever. Amen." This is just a great picture of godly giving, of faithful stewardship. And my hope today is that as we all walk and grow in faithfulness in this area, that we would learn the secret of contentment that Paul talks about, that we would learn that the joy of the master, that it is more blessed to give than it is to receive. That we would learn to do all things through Christ who strengthens us, that we would press on faithfully toward that day where we will hear those words. "Well done, good and faithful servants, you have been faithful over a little. I will put you over much calm and enter into the joy of your master." And if you haven't been faithful in this area, well my challenge to you today is that you would start today. You take that first step of faith and really put God to the test and see if he will not answer with faithfulness and help you to experience all these blessings that we have talked about today. And I say that not to seek the gift, as Paul said, it's not just about the money. He says in verse nine, "It's not that I seek the gift, it's that I seek the fruit that increases to your credit." Now with that being said, would you please join me in prayer and we'll continue and worship this morning. Lord, as we close today, I remember Acts 20:35, which tells us to remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ. How He himself said, it is more blessed to give than to receive. And we thank you that this is true and we know it is true because you have proven it is true that you are the most blessed and you are the one who has given more than any of us could ask or even imagine in your son Jesus Christ. God, we thank you for your abundant provision in our lives. Every breath we take, every moment is a gift from your hands. And we pray that you would help us by the power of your Holy Spirit to not waste it, to steward it well, to use every ounce of time, talent, treasure that you have entrusted to us, to invest that for the sake of your kingdom and glory, willingly, joyfully knowing that you are our good Father who provides for all our needs. Help us to steward well. Everything we have to bring you, honor and glory to you, our joyful master, our generous father, help us to be faithful over little so that we can be given even more. And Lord, we do all of this as we long to hear those words. Well done, good and faithful servants. Lord, I pray that those words would be heard by every soul that is gathered here today. And I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Good Works

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 19, 2023 51:31


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Heavenly Father, we praise you that you have made this day. We thank you for the light, the bright, almost spring sky that just reminds us of the light of Christ coming into our lives, penetrating the darkness of our souls and the situations that we have lived in. And we praise you that in every season and every situation, we can trust you. We pray right now, Lord, that you would show us how to trust you in the small moments of life, how to trust you in the training that you are providing for us through day-to-day life. Give us just great joy to honor you and serve you in all situations. And we pray that we would all leave here encourage and embolden to be your disciples and to face a world that does not know you or love you. Please, Holy Spirit fill us that we might be fruitful servants this week. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. And as I mentioned, we are talking about our commitment to good works. And as I prepared for this sermon, it really made me respect Pastor Shane's service throughout this series. I realize that every topic he's taken up has been a huge topic. We've talked about commitment to following Christ, commitment to the local church, evangelism, discipleship, scripture, prayer, fasting, worship and calling. And I think he's done an incredible job to consolidate these giant topics with a lot of scripture in forming them into just digestible just amounts of wisdom for us. And today, the task about talking about our commitment to good works as Christians could be endless. And really the reason is because everybody, not even just Christians, they know that Christians should commit themselves to good works. As Christians, we know verses like Ephesians 2, eight through 10. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God. Not a result of works so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. And so we know these key verses, these popular verses when good works, but people who aren't even Christian know that we are called to good works. I walk around the Brookline parks often with my children. And when a non-Christian man or woman, when their dog invades my personal space or my children's personal space, I reward their evil with kindness and bring up the church and Jesus Christ. And those conversations typically result in them really just without any preparation, having a list of good works that Christians should be doing, good works that the church should be doing. And so there's no shortage of thought and conversation in our world around what good Christians should be doing in day-to-day life. And there's no shortage of scriptures around this topic. And so we can talk about Christian good works in many ways, but what the Lord has been giving me the past few weeks as I've pondered this topic, commitment to good works. It's been filled with a strong dose of realism. You see, the last four weeks I've had big plans to do a lot of good works. I planned and scheduled many counseling sessions, many meetings with leaders of the church, tried to set aside time to proactively pour myself in the study and prayer and planning for future endeavors to take up in the church. But the Lord has caused me to postpone a lot of that work or begrudgingly do it in the early hours of the morning or late hours of the night after my children have gone to bed. And in this period, why have I had this situation? We've had four weeks. We had two weeks of sickness, colds and stomach bugs pass from one person to another from school and daycare. We had two snow days. Childcare fell through for one day of the week for one of my children for several days. We had to deal with daylight savings. This Tuesday, after I dropped off my children and one gets straight to work. I came back to my condo building and the public laundry machine right next to my unit was banging really loudly. It was like a sledgehammer pounding on the wall and I stepped out, it was overheating, it was smoking, it was melting, it's some of its machinery and I was the only person there to address it. So I ended up having to just address the situation, ended up having to take my neighbor's laundry and actually do her laundry for her, wasted a few hours of that morning. And so it's been quite a month as I've had looked at this date where I have to preach about commitment to good works and my availability to do good works and capacity and energy has been severely limited. And I don't tell you this to ask you for pity or to just get some sort of catharsis, emotional purging. I tell you this to really introduce the lesson of the day regarding good works. And really I hope through my sermon teach you the main lesson of the sermon. Through all that I've faced in the past month, I've been reciting just a verse that I've memorized years ago, James chapter one, verse two through five. And what I've learned with time as this month has passed is that our ability to do good works for God is highly dependent upon our ability to receive God's training for good works in day-to-day life. Our ability to do good works for God is highly dependent upon our ability to receive God's training for good works in day-to-day life. And so what do I mean by training? A personal example of the training that God has called me to as a pastor is how I stand over what's happening in my house. One of the requirements, one of the character qualities of a pastor is found in 1 Timothy three, four to five. It says, he must manage his own household well with all dignity, keeping his children submissive. For if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God's church. Right? So I'm called to, part of the central era of training for me to serve as a pastor is as the head of my household. And what did the Lord require me to do over and over again in the past few weeks with a lot of these unforeseen challenges, he forced me to give the priority of my time and attention to my household. Love my wife, love my children, make sure that everything was going well. Try to continue to train them in the word despite all of the hiccups, make sure everyone's healthy and strong. And now when I had to pause from my good works that I planned for the church and outside of the home, how do you think I felt in the moment? I did not receive a lot of these moments and these things that I thought as inconveniences as my training, but really it is, it was. Fortunately, I did have my wife there to remind me that these situations were, these scenarios that I faced were essential to my training for doing good works in the church, but I struggled to view it as training. Another area where God has called me to do training is just as a neighbor, right? Christ says, the primary commandments are to love God, the Lord your God to all your heart, soul, strength in mind and love your neighbor as yourself. And furthermore too elders of the church. He says, moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders so that he may not fall into disgrace. And so my training took place this week in that situation, when that washing machine was banging against the wall and seemingly melting itself. I literally had a crossroads moment of I can act like I'm not hearing that sledgehammer sound and get on with my day or I can responsibly address it. And I did follow in the ways. I followed the smell, I had turned off the machine, unplugged it. And you know what? If I didn't, I would've missed an opportunity. With that laundry, my neighbor's laundry was completely soaked still and is covered in detergent. And so it's this woman, recently widowed whose husband did everything for her in life. And so a thing like laundry is a lot for her. And she was just absolutely distraught that the machines were off, her whole schedule was thrown off for the day. So I said, I can work from home. I'll put your laundry in my machine. So when I did her laundry, it just amazed her that a person would pause and do an act, a simple act of kindness like that. She was so touched that she went out, and I'm not trying to brag about myself, I'm saying I could have missed this. She went out, she bought flowers. Not for me, for my wife. She knew the best way to bless me was to bless my wife. And this little illustration of we can miss these moments of training if we get lost in thinking that all of our works, good works as Christians are out there. They're these big grand gestures, often ones that you can take pictures of and post on social media. But what the Lord wants us to do is view trials, view tests, view conflicts that you need to address as your training and actually as the good works that he's calling you to do. And do you want... As you listen to this, if you know Christ, you know that if you have experienced the love of God, he has offered his son for you on the cross, despite your sin. You cannot but want to live a life for his glory and do good. That's really what's behind Christian works. If you don't want to offer yourself entirely for God, you have to really pause and question your faith and ask, Lord, do I know you? Do I really love you? Pour out your love upon me. Let me just be amazed by your grace. But Christians, it's an assumption that you want to do good works. And so how do you do good works? How can you continue to do works for the length of your life? And so I instruct you today, ask yourself, how are you training me, God? What are some trial, storms, broken situations that he's put in your life? How are you addressing them? Are you looking at them as inconveniences? Are you dismissing them as insignificant compared to the greater things out there, outside of your household that you want to do? Are you handling them unfaithfully with a poor attitude? Really ask yourself, Lord, how are you training me? Again, I said James one, one through five as the passage that I've just recited in my mind. The Lord use the simple set of verses to help me through this season and it's what I want to meditate on today to drive home this point. And I just want to hammer home, the main single point of the sermon is the degree to which Christians can stay committed to good works for God is dependent upon the degree to which they can rejoice in their training from God. The degree to which Christians can stay committed to good works for God is dependent upon the degree to which they can rejoice in their training from God. And so this is, I pull this from James one chapters one through five, and I just want to just belabor this point because I think it's so essential. Especially for a young, really hopeful believers. We have a very young church and we have a tendency to just look, see people post on social media, read books of great endeavors that Christians have taken up through history at the cost of really having sight for how the Lord is teaching us, training us, using us in day-to-day life. So I'm going to read James one, one through five and continue on this point and we'll walk through the text to elaborate on it. So I have my Bible down there. Can't fit my notes in my Bible here. So I'll read from my notes. James one, this is the word of our Lord. James, a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ to the 12 tribes of the dispersion, greetings. Count it all joy my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds. For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness and let steadfastness habits full effect that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach and it will be given him. So who is James? The little background kind of emphasizes the thrust of the points going forward. Who's James? James is the brother of Jesus, the half-brother of Jesus. The son of Mary and Joseph, one of the sons. And the Apostle Paul mentions that James actually got a special visitation post resurrection from Jesus, first Corinthians 15, 6 to 7 says, then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to the apostles. Perhaps this is the moment that James committed his life to Christ, received him as his savior and Lord. 4 John 75 says, for not even his brothers, Jesus believed him. And I just dab into this background because it makes the first word of the book of the James amazing. James one, one. James, a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ. A servant, doulas in the Greek. It means servant, slave, bond servant. A bond servant is someone who willingly dedicated their entire life to service to another. So James says he's a bond servant of Jesus Christ, this brother that grew up in his household. Further, James goes on to say that he's a bond servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ. In doing this, he's equating Jesus Christ with God. And that's pretty amazing given that Jesus again was his earthly brother. And I just want to elaborate on this point because this is one of the reasons why we believed scripture. A guy who grew up with Jesus, lived his life and in submission and believe saw him as a savior. And James writes here about suffering. He probably suffered for the sake of his brother's kingdom, not just advised the church as he does in these verses. So at the end of verse one, James tells us that the letter is addressed to the 12 tribes of the dispersion. This doesn't mean that it's not relevant for gentiles in his day or us. What this reference to 12 tribes is an appeal to persecution, a persecution that happened amongst his readers. James was one of the leaders. He was Jewish, he was one of the pastors of the church, placed his faith in Christ, became a pastor, committed his life to Christ. And at one point during the history of his tenure, there was a great persecution of the Jews. He's appealing to a time when believers, probably primarily Jewish believers were persecuted and scattered. And scripture talks about in Acts 7 when Saul, before he became the Apostle Paul, persecuted Steven, went house to house persecuting Christians. Act 8, one says, and there are rose on that day, a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem and they're all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samara except the apostles. And so James is appealing to this group of believers who have been persecuted and it's not just they face persecution from Jews who were mad that they became Christian. It's probably you have to think about the internal family strife that they faced. They left. Think of any Jewish friends you have today and what it would mean for them socially, familiarly to receive Christ as their Lord and Savior. These people experienced it to the stream. They're probably kicked out of households, lost their inheritance, lives worth, physically threatened for Jesus. And all of this really just drives home, just makes James next words just that much more powerful when he says, count it all joy my brothers and sisters ] when you meet trials of various kinds. And so James is talking to these people, this population who's been scattered, persecuted, probably kicked out of their homes and he is telling them to count it all joy. Everything that they're facing and it's just, we have to pause here because it is ludicrous. We're allowed to look at the text and say, this sounds crazy. Trials, conflicts, persecutions, storms. They're not things we typically consider to be joyful. Rather, we tend to think of them and label them with other derogatory terms. But James is trying to get his audience and us to zoom out of our worldly logic. He's trying to get Christians to consider what he is saying with supernatural logic. He's appealing to the cross of Jesus Christ here. Apart from the central story of Christianity, this call to count at all joy when you meet trials of various kinds makes no sense. And so how does someone look at trials, conflict and experience joy? It's only if you believe that the most excruciating experience of pain in the history of the world, the most ugly act of violence against the sinless son of God. If you only believe that this moment of Jesus Christ, the sinless son of God being put on the cross, was redeemed into the most beautiful act of history in the world, the resurrection that procured the salvation of God's children. Then you can count sufferings, trials, storms, tests, training as joy. And so, no, this isn't like sadistic like advice from James. He doesn't want these people to suffer because he is evil. He's not alone in providing such wisdom and scripture. God is not a sadist. Again, he's calling them to rejoice. He's not saying rejoice because this trial is in your life. The fact of it, he's saying rejoice in it. Seek joy in it. There's a big difference there. And he's saying, look, Christian, you are struggling right now, but you're not facing anything that compares to the struggle that Jesus Christ experienced when his own father turned his back on him for your salvation. He's saying, if you believe that Jesus Christ, his just terrible death was the means for God to procure your salvation, your redemption. You can trust the Lord in this moment, trust that he's sovereign over it, trust that he can use it for your good in his glory. And so James is appealing to the central part of Christianity. When he says, count it all joy. The Lord does work in this mysterious way where he can use brokenness for his glory and that's the source of hope for Christians when we are facing trials. And notice that the text doesn't say count it all joy if you meet trials. It says count it all joy when you meet trials. The assumption is that every single Christian worships a God who redeemed us, not in despite of Christ's suffering, but through Christ's suffering. And so Christ himself said, a servant could not be above his master. Every Christian is going to face suffering. This Christian life is not just a rosy walk where you are going through life and everything goes well for you and people when you share the gospel always receive you kindly. It's going to be a challenging one. And so how are you going to respond? Do you believe that Christian, do you believe you can actually have joy in it? And we need to be thinking along these lines. If we're not expecting the trials, not expecting the pain of some of these situations as Christian, we're just going to live in shock. And how do many Christians respond to trials? There's a few typical ways. A lot of Christians face challenges and they just get paralyzed. They say, I am too frightened about facing this head on. I don't want to engage the tension. I can't see the way forward in my own strength and they just become just useless for the kingdom. A lot of Christians, they face trials and what do they do? They over busy themselves to escape the fact that there's a tension lingering in their life. There's a situation that they have to trust God but they don't want to. They'll do everything they can to distract themselves. A lot of people just don't acknowledge it and they sweep it under the rug and then it comes back to really biting them. And so we can't be shocked by these tests and we know that facing them in faith is good. And that's what James says, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. For you know it's an appeal to something that we know, but something that we tend to selectively forget as Christians. When we're lashing out, when we're groaning, when we're complaining about the difficulty or simply avoiding it all together. We know that the Lord, especially when we look upon the cross, can use the most trying of circumstances for his glory. And so we know this, we know that the pain of a good workout results in a good pump and greater strength, greater flexibility, greater energy levels. We know this, like we know that studying for a test does often, more often than not result in greater results on the exam. We know that preparing, putting the time to prepare for a recital pays off in better performance. But in our faith, when we're challenged by trials, we don't lose this all together. We don't pause and think, how could God be using me for his glory? How could he be strengthening me and sanctifying me for greater works in the future? We easily forget this and I do too. I'm guilty. I had many times where in the past few weeks I just got overtaken by anger before just the Lord convicted me or my wife God on me. But James says that we know that the testing of our faith produces steadfastness. Steadfastness, a better translation here instead of steadfastness might be endurance. The testing of our faith produces endurance. In the Greek, the word carries the meaning of the perseverance that it takes to finish a marathon. That's significant. For the Bible talks about the Christian life, it speaks of it in terms of a long race like a marathon. 2 Timothy 4, 6 to 7 says, for I'm already being poured out as a drink offering and the time of my departures come. This is the Apostle Paul toward the end of his ministry. I've fought the good fight. I've finished the race, I've kept the faith. I was thinking in between services, it's like a life as a Christian is a long boxing match. And I'm from Philadelphia, so for some reason I thought was triggered to a lot of life is Rocky just taking on opponents that are so much better than him. But in the end he somehow finds the way. He wins or he loses righteously and earns the respect of his opponent and wins their heart over. But there's stick to the marathon. A lot of this life is like it's a marathon. Christian life is a marathon. A long race that requires a lot of preparation, a lot of endurance, a lot of pain tolerance to go forward. And we need to be realistic about that. I believe we're at this point because I know a lot of you are sprinters, a lot of you are good for going 50 meters to a hundred meters really fast. I've worked for churches for almost a decade now and you see so many people sign up, sign up for five ministry teams, just really pour themselves out, show up to everything for a couple of months, flame out. And then you see people in the church who are there at least for a year is a little bit better than the people who flame out and disappear in a couple months. You see a lot of people in the church for years just stuck in this cycle of going hard, burning out, going hard in engagement with the church and their faith, burning out. You need to maybe retain those sprinter tendencies with your work that might benefit you. But in your spiritual life, how do you change your approach to become a marathoner? And notice I'm not talking about 75% of the people who run the Boston Marathon. I've lived on Beacon Street, I still live a block away. I lived on the street of the Pittsburgh Marathon and watching marathons is very painful. You get that first wave and then you... I've always lived on my mile 15 and it's just people who shouldn't be running marathons just crawling their way forward and you just don't know how they'll get there. I find it to be very painful and I pray for them and I say, well, they're doing something that I'm not and I really fight my heart to respect them. But we are not called to be marathoners who are just limping through at mile 15. There's 26.2 miles in a marathon. And so as Christians we want to... Like how does that affect, how can that be a good witness for our great God? And there's this balance as Christians in day-to-day life, we don't need to lead with our strength. We lead with the fact by telling people I need God's grace daily, but at the same time we can pursue excellence for God's glory. And so we don't want to be marathon runners who, sprinters who flame out a hundred meters in. We don't want to be marathon runners who are just crawling forward at a snail's pace. You have to learn to walk far then you have to learn how to do a speed walk. You can do the Olympic silly style of walking. You can then learn how to jog and then try to get to a pace where you're running at a solid pace. And the Lord is using you to attract people to his kingdom as you just try to offer yourself as a living sacrifice to build your witness up daily. And so Christianity, it's a marathon. What James is doing to these primarily Jewish believers, he's not saying, I feel bad for you. You've been persecuted. Like there's not really much sympathy in his message. It's greetings, kind of cold hard wisdom. This is what you need and he's training them well. He just gets to the heart of you need to see that, pursue joy in these moments. You need to trust that the Lord and your challenges is growing you and there's a fruit of steadfastness, of perseverance that will help you finish the race. And we need to apply this in our own lives. We need to learn how to pace ourselves. And so when our faith is tested by storms, like we really have to pause and say, Lord, what are you teaching us? Verse four, he carries on. Let steadfastness slash endurance have its full effect so that you may be perfect. By perfect, he's not talking about being sinless necessarily or not messing up anymore. By perfect, he means having reached the finish line, finish the race, getting to the point of full flourishing and wholeness that God wants you to attain on this side of heaven. He's saying like go as far as you can in the pursuit of Christ-likeness and holiness. That's what the Lord is calling you to do. And in this life that use of let. Let steadfastness endurance have its full effect. He's saying you need to let hardship have its way with you so that you can finish the race, so that you can be made perfect, complete, lacking in nothing. There's this element to where we are responsible for the way that we respond to these trials and the way that we respond to them affects how much we get out of them. So God wants to give and his talking about God is being generous here. He wants to give you a lot of blessings, not just an eternity but in this life. And so how can you trust the Lord in them? He wants to give you blessings so that you can be a blessing and be able to better tell more people about the love and mercy of God. Do you really want that? If so, trust him in the tension, the challenges, complete, lacking in nothing. James is saying that God wants us to have the whole portion that this race, this life offers. And whatever that is, whatever it is for each of us, I think you can pause and ask, what is it that you think he wants you to have? What are you lacking in Christian character? What are you lacking in your gifting, in your arsenal of things you can use for the advancement of God's kingdom? What are you lacking in Christ-Likeness, holiness? That's probably what God is trying to grow in you in these moments, in these situations and hardships. And you have to pause and heed the lessons. For us to understand what James is talking about, we need to understand just a few key verses that are helpful here that continue in this main. Romans 8:28 says, and we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. We need to really know and believe that God has purpose, that the trials in our lives will bear fruit for his kingdom and for our good. And it's really a matter of faith here. And this is not prosperity gospel. I'm already telling you, you're going to face trials, but trust that the Lord can use them for the advancement of his kingdom and your good. It really comes down to in the moment, do you trust that he is using these situations for good? And that's right now, some of you are in hard phases and trials and it feels like torture. But can you stay present in the moment and trust that he might do good in your life through it, he might refine your character, he might give you perspective to be a better disciple. He might use you to save someone by staying faithful and not lashing out in the moment. Furthermore, Hebrews 12, 7:11 says, it is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons for what son is there whom his father does not discipline. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant. But later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. So God has purposed that through endurance in trials and storms, there will be a harvest of righteousness, a peaceful work of God that will come from this. So as you are going through life planning a lot of good works, but then being slowed down by these trials and conflicts and storms, are you open to God training you like this? Do you see these situations as inconveniences that stifle your interests on all those great works out there? Or do you see that God might be training you and he might be saying, this is the good work I want you to do right now. Stay faithful in it so that maybe I can bring you to that grand thing later. Will you have the faith to just trust God at his word with these verses? Do you want endurance and steadfastness? A lot of people, these are just foreign categories. The sprinter is out there. You just don't even know this. If people engage you this week and say you're a sprinter, you don't know steadfast. I love your witness for Christ when you're like on for about two weeks, but you don't know steadfastness, really seek it. Seek faithfulness in these moments, read, study this topic. The passage says, let steadfastness have its full effect. This is again, let. We need to let God the Holy Spirit speak to us, give us what we need to learn from our trials. We need to have a devotional life that on day-to-day basis to allow God as we engage his words, speak to us, to help us identify that lesson. He's trying to teach us God's promise says that he has good purposes for our trials. He's disciplining us like a father, but there's this element of responsibility to let. And so a lot of this letting is a check of our pride. A lot of Christians think I've suffered too much for the kingdom. I don't deserve this situation, this scenario. We have to be humble in difficult times even as we go further. And really the lesson is as you look at scripture, is those great leaders that God has given great responsibility to, he has humbled them through just brutal experiences. And that he couldn't use them for good things, until he just broke all elements of pride within their being. And we need to have humility and difficult times to say, Lord, I probably need to learn something from this. And there's an element of you can, James goes into this, count it all joy. There's an element to as the Lord is shaping you and training you, it can be joyful. For you can say, Lord, you have saved me. You have used the cross to save me. You have the power to use such a moment. You can use any challenge to refine me, shape me, grow your kingdom. Lord, have your way with me. Let your will be done. And that can be a very joyful process. You can have joy in the midst of sorrow and trial and you can have joy that just the existence of the sorrow is just an affirmation that God's loving fatherly hand of discipline is upon you. It can be joyful or you can resist it and ignore it and it can be dreadful. And a lot of Christians, you really need to learn to embrace this moment, all moments you're facing. Are you in it? Is it the will of God? If you're there, it is. And seek the presence of mind and the humility to receive what God has for you and even have the hope that you can't just survive it, but that you can have joy in it. And so Christian, what hinders you from hearing these lessons? A lot of people face challenges and trials and storms and they respond with just bitterness. Some of you might just be bitter. God has forced by his severe mercy hard situation on your life that really could be a great means of learning, of growth and steadfastness, of great growth and wisdom for you. But you are so mad at him that you have never paused to try to figure out why he did that, what his purposes could be, what perspective, how he could use that for his glory going forward. Are you just a Christian that doesn't want to hear any of this because you're bitter? Christian is it bad theology? Someone told you that Christian life would be easy? Has someone told you that God only has good things and good plans for you? The tendency of the struggle with these kinds of things like yeah, God works all things for the good who walk according to his purpose. But the issue in these situation is that people don't want to submit what is good to the ways that God has submitted it. And so what is good? It is all that which honors God, all that which grows Christ-likeness in me and in others and spreads forth God's kingdom. And so according to his word as the most blatant clear revelation of those things. And so have you surrendered what is good to God? If not, that's going to get in your way of having joy and learning and growing in these situations. Many of us are just really impatient. We live in an on-demand culture and we have been for decades. We don't really have to wait for anything. We don't see crops being grown outside. We don't see just how food is prepared. We put it in the microwave. We just get everything instantly. And we're not aware that just like the moment of time of history that we've been born into has bred just impatience in us. And so we need to pause and see just Lord sit back. One of the ways that a lot of Christians just are disobedient is that they don't take a Sabbath. They don't pursue, they don't commit a whole day to the Lord for they have greater good things to do. And there's no way the Lord will contradict himself. He wants you to pause once a week to take in, to let your body, let your heart, let your mind refresh, to better take in how he is working in your life and how you can from that day forward better serve him in your life. A lot of Christians, what they wrongly do is they get lost in a bit of a prosperity gospel. Just believing that God is only working and they're flourishing their success and they rebuke moments of trials and discomfort and convenience as something that just must be denied altogether or declared as satanic. They don't have eyes to see, ears to hear, they completely missed the moments of trials. And these people just get stunted in there development. Everything is over spiritualized. There's no reflection in the moment of, Lord, I'm in this situation. This is hard. Search me and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. See if there'll be any grievous way with me and lead me in the way of everlasting. There's no heart check. It's always something on the outside that is causing, Satan particularly, that's causing this inconvenience. And so people blame the devil, they blame other things. A lot of Christians just look at hardship and say, I'm doing something wrong. And that is right there, the gospel is that we're not saved by our works. We're saved by God's grace. His grace is always there to save us, to help us in the way forward. And we're just stuck in an achievement type mentality. And know sometimes God has ordained hardship for us. And ultimately what this text is teaching, it's for our joy, for our good, for our ability to persevere. One Peter 4:19 encapsulates a lot, basically all that I've said. Therefore, let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls to a faithful creator while doing good. And so it's a faithful and trust your soul to a faithful creator while suffering, while doing good. And it really is a matter of faith in these moments. Can you trust God when you're facing the trial, when he's put hardship in your life to train you? Says, will you trust him? And that's a yes or no. And if you're going to be split minded about it, that joy, that ability to see the situation through in a way that glorifies him will not be there. And after all of this, we ask, why does God test us? Why does he train us like this as his disciples? And God doesn't put us in the fire, the crucible just because it gives him pleasure. He puts us in the fire because he cares more about holiness instead of momentary happiness. Because he knows that holiness breeds true joy and joy that's rooted in him and that's what he wants. If he really wants what is best for us, he's going to just expose us just to that which is going to bring about true holiness, true joy. And he is good in it. Even if in the moment it's hard for us to understand that and agree. God, ultimately, he's trying to breed greater dependence on him than us. Verse five says, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach and it will be given him. So God doesn't want us to go forward doing our work for his kingdom, thinking that it all depends on us. He wants us to grow in our dependence on him. He knows that we are going to stop short in the race if we do it on our own strength. He wants us to become more and more dependent on him and trust that his Holy Spirit is there with us and working in us and through us. Furthermore, he wants us to develop a loving and abiding relationship with him. When we are stretched in this cycle of going out, being stretched, being faithful in the tense moments to the point that our bodies, our souls are on the brink of being crushed to our mindset, but then we're drawn in and we go to Him. He wants us to get to truly see that he, his presence, his wisdom is actually what satisfies our souls and gives us joy. It's not achieving anything in the world, it's not showing our own strength, it's just living in his presence. These challenges force us to go to him in communion and say, God, help me. It challenges us to learn more about him, to understand how he works. And when you understand that, you grow in your appreciation and love for him, you grow in your appreciation of how he is sovereignly directing your life, shaping and cultivating you to become more like Christ and you love him all the more. Your faith goes from just an appreciation of deliverance from sin and the power of sin and the chance of be in heaven to God, I just love you because I love you. As I see your heart, as I see your ability to redeem the hardest, the most challenging of moments for your glory, for my good, for the salvation and sanctification of others in my life. I love you more. And do you really want that? That's a deepening of faith that a lot of people, because they just don't even stay present in trials, they don't even know this experience of Christianity. Of just, I love this life because I know God, you are with me. That's all I need. That's all I want. Use me as you will. And if that means struggle and conflict and trial, so be it. And so when Christians understand this, it changes them. It gives you wholeness as you are forced to just lean on the Lord more and more because you turn to him, you receive his guidance, you receive as counsel, it becomes a greater part of you. And so you have to master this. If you want to do good works for God, we can't really start off with a sermon on listing them out, on identifying the most important ones, on how we and our contexts can do the most for His glory here. If you don't understand how he trains you, if you don't understand the cycle of going to him in the midst of the trial to be satisfied, to find the way forward. And so Christian, do you want to do good works? Do you want to commit yourself to them for the rest of your life? Do you want to persevere to the end being used tremendously by God? I ask, think about how is God training you right now and rejoice in the training. Let me pray to close. Heavenly Father, we praise you for your wisdom. We praise you that what is foolishness to men is a means of your glory and our glory and our growth. Lord, you have the ability to just use the darkest of moments, the most challenging of moments, the graves of sin for your eternal purposes of redemption and making us new and bringing about, just working toward the return of Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray, give us faith to trust you. To trust that in the hardship you are working in us and through us, and training us so that we might love you more and we might have greater capacity to serve you if we trust you through it. Give us faith to trust that we can actually have joy in the midst of sorrow and trial and hardship. Give us great hope that all of this sacrifice is worth it. That when we lay ourselves down daily, you are glorified and that you are actually using these moments for your eternal purposes. And let us trust that your wisdom is so much higher than ours. And when we do this, let us just have peace. Peace that transcends understanding. And as we exhibit that peace, use it to draw others home to your kingdom. Pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to your Calling

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 12, 2023 55:53


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. Today, we are continuing our sermon series committed talking about the essential habits of an abundant life. I think we are eight weeks into this series and we got about three weeks left to go and then that's going to bring us up to Easter Sunday already. And so looking forward to that. And this week we are tackling what is probably the most ambitious topic in this entire sermon series. I sat down to prepare the sermon this week and I realized this really could have been like three separate sermons and so tons of editing to get it down into one. And I promise I'll talk fast. If you listen fast, we'll try to get through all of it. But this is not going to be an exhaustive sermon on this topic. But hopefully it's at least a good introduction into our topic today because our topic today is the topic of calling. And the question before us is what is the meaning of life? What is the purpose of life? What is more specifically your purpose in life? Why are you here? I think one of the most frightening and dreadful feelings that a person can have is the sober consideration of a meaningless existence. It's contemplating the possibility that your life might have no purpose. Or even worse that it does, but you are failing to find that or to fulfill that purpose. We live in a world where we have so many options of what we could spend our lives doing, that we are oftentimes paralyzed by all of the possibilities before us. And rather than helping us come to a decision, all of the options actually seem to make the problem even more complex of finding out what is our purpose. Because now in addition to figuring that out, we have the pressure of making sure that of all of these options before us that we choose the right thing. And what if we get that wrong? I think about the opportunity cost of getting something like that wrong. We only have one life to live. How are we supposed to live it? And that can be terrifying. Like what if we are to reach the end of our lives only to look back and see that we never truly lived, that we never truly figured out why we were here, what we were supposed to be doing. And that's a very real fear that most of us have experienced at one time or another. And the only real solution to this is something that Christians have often referred to as calling. And John Calvin in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, he wrote this. He said that, "The Lord bids each one of us in all of life's actions to look to his calling. For, he knows with what great restlessness human nature flames, with what fickleness it is born hither and thither, how its ambition longs to embrace various things at once, therefore less through our stupidity and rashness everything be turned topsy-turvy, he has appointed duties to every man in his particular way of life. And that no one may thoughtlessly transgress his limits, he has named those various kind of livings, callings. Therefore, each individual has his own kind of living assigned to him by the Lord as a sort of century post so that he may not heedlessly wander about throughout life." As Christians, we believe that God has a plan, he has a purpose for every one of his children. And that this purpose is something that we can know, that we have a calling that we need to discern and to answer. And my hope today is that we will look to God's word together and as we do learn to discern what God is calling us to do throughout the various seasons of our life. And so if you have your Bible open, up the Colossians chapter three. We're going to go through this entire chapter actually all the way through chapter four verse one. And I'm not going to read the entire text up here up front because it's a little bit longer. We're going to take it just section by section and work through it together. And as we do, I want us to focus on helping you to discern and to commit to four things. Number one, to commit to your general calling. That's going to be the first 17 verses. Second, commit to your seasonal calling. That's the next few. And then commit to your particular calling. And then at the end we'll look at this idea of commit to receiving an inheritance in heaven and leaving a legacy here on earth. And so I'm going to start just by reading the first 17 verses. This is Colossians chapter three, beginning in verse one. And the Apostle Paul writes this. He says, "If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you. Sexual immorality and purity, passion, evil desire and covetousness which is idolatry and account of these, the wrath of God is coming. In these you two once walked when you were living in them, but now you must put them all away. Anger, wrath, malice, slander and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jews circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarians and slave free. But Christ is all and in all. Put on then as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience bearing with one another. And if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other. As the Lord is forgiving you, so also you must forgive. And above all of these, put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. In whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." This is the reading of God's word for us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? Lord, we thank you that you are a God who knows each of us individually, that you care for each of us individually and you have gifted and equipped each of us individually according to your purposes and plan. Lord, help us today to know how each of our lives can bring you the most glory, can do the most good according to the unique gifts, opportunities, and personality that you have given us both together as a church and individually as your people. Lord, help our words, our deeds, whatever we do to be done for your glory and the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and out of thankfulness in our hearts to you our God and Father. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, point number one today is to commit to your general calling. Before we get into the topic of discerning and committing to or your specific or your particular calling, we need to understand that God has given a general calling to all Christians, to everyone who is a follower of Christ that we need to answer. And we know that first of all, we are called to Christ, that through the call of the gospel we are called to become followers of Jesus. But then Paul shows us that in Christ we are also called to a few different things. We are called as we see in this text to live with a new identity, to live as part of a new family, the household of God, and to live in a new way, a new manner of living as well. And so first of all, we say that we're called to live with a new identity. Verse two, Paul says, "Set your minds on the things that are above, not on the things that are on earth for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ and God." And in verse nine he says, "Don't lie to one another saying that you've put off the old self with its practices and if you've put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator." And he says here, "There's not Greek or Jew, circumcised, uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free. But Christ is in all." And the big idea here is that he wants us to see is that when you are called to Christ, that you're not just given a better life, that you are given a new life, that the old you dies and that you become a new creation in Christ. And Christ then becomes the centering principle of your life. That this is your identity. And so your past, your reputation, your ethnicity, your job, your bank account, your education, your pedigree, none of that matters. That Christ is all and is in all, that you become a Christian period with no adjective to qualify that statement. We stand before the cross of Christ, all of us from our various backgrounds, we all come, we stand before level ground and we are all then unified, made one body in Jesus Christ. And this is our new identity that we are called to live in, to walk in. And this new identity, it leads directly to the second thing that we're called to do, which is to live and to love a new family. That we're saved out of the world and into the body of Christ, into the church. And Paul gives us instructions of how we are to behave as children in this family, as members of this body. And in verse 12 he says, "And so therefore put on then as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience bearing with one another. And if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other as the Lord is forgiven, you also must forgive. And above all these things put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts to which indeed you are called in one body and be thankful with the word of Christ dwell in you richly teaching and an admonishing one another with all wisdom and singing Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts." To God, this is how you are to behave and relate to one another in the church. The Jesus saved you out of the world and into this family, the God the Father, he finds us as orphans lost in our sin and he adopts us into his family by the blood of his son Jesus Christ. And this is important because one of the reasons that I think a lot of Christians struggle with discerning God's will or sensing what he is calling them to do and perhaps therefore feel like they're lost, like they're wandering throughout life. Well, it starts because they have failed to answer this first calling, to join themselves to a local body of believers, to surround themselves by the body of Christ because scripture tells us plainly that when Christians fail to do this, that a Christian without the church, it's like a leaf being blown about in the wind or it's like a child that is stunted in its growth, that is suspended in a state of adolescence, not growing, not maturing. And Paul talks about this in Ephesians chapter four. He's describing the church and the purpose of the church and God's vision for the church. And he says that God gave to the church, the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers in order to equip the saints, all of us, the church, the members of the body to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, for building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning and by craftiness and deceitful schemes, rather speaking the truth and love or to grow up into every way into him who is the head into Christ, from whom the whole body joint and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. And so before we can begin to discern our particular callings in life, we need to understand before anything else that this is God's will for you, for me, for us. His will is for us to understand, to live in this new identity that we have in Christ and in this new family to become members of a local church, to commit ourselves to a group of believers who are going to know us and can encourage us and hold us accountable and support us throughout this life of following Jesus. Because the third thing that we're going to see as we follow Jesus, as we're called to Christ, is that we're also called to learn a whole new way of life, a whole new manner of living. And we're going to need people around to help us do this. This is not going to be easy. Verse five, he says, "And so therefore put to death therefore what is earthly in you, sexual immorality, impurity, passions, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry." He says, "The wrath of God is coming and these you two once walked when you were living in them, but now you must put them all away. Anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth and do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of his creator." Says, "Jesus calls us to a whole new way of life, a whole new manner of living, a new morality with new purpose, new identity, new family." And we need a proper understanding of this general calling that we all have because this is going to be like the prerequisite foundation to everything else that we're going to talk about this morning, that we can't begin building the rest of our lives and answering the rest of our callings until we have this solid foundation. If you want to know what God is calling you to do specifically, you always need to begin with what he has already called you to do clearly and generally in his word. That God is never going to call you to do something that contradicts his will, that contradicts his word revealed to us in scripture. And so commit to your general calling. And then number two, commit to your seasonal calling. Verse 17, Paul says, "Whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." And then he shifts. He just got done saying, this is how you're going to need to live and behave. This is how you're called to be in the household of God and now this is how you're going to be called to be in your household. And so he begins giving instructions for the household. He begins with wives. Verse 18, "Wives submit to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Children obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. And fathers do not provoke your children less they become discouraged." So he shows us how to relate to one another. In God's household, here He shows us how to relate to one another in our households. And obviously this is not an exhaustive teaching, like scripture has a lot more to say about these familial relationships than what we see here. But for our purposes today, I just want us to begin by seeing this, that God is going to call you, he's going to assign to you certain responsibilities throughout different seasons of your life and those things are going to change and evolve over time. And your responsibilities as a child are going to look a lot different than the responsibilities that the Lord assigns to you as an adult. You're going to have certain things that God calls you to do when you're single that are going to be different than the things he calls you to do if and when you get married or if and when you have children. And we don't think about this here in Boston very often because we're a very young city, but someday you're going to have the responsibilities as a child again. And if you haven't experienced this yet, the day is coming where you're going to be not under your parents' care. Your parents in some ways are going to come under your care. If they get sick or as they're aging, as they're approaching the end of life. And eventually they're going to need you to be there in that season. Eventually you're going to be in that season yourself needing the help of others as you approach that season of life. And so like our general calling, these seasonal callings, they are prerequisite considerations as we try to discern our particular callings. And we're going to get to the particular calling here in a little bit. But first I want us to take a closer look at some of these seasonal callings that Paul talks about in the text. He begins with instructions for the wives. Verse 18, it says, "Wives submit to your husband's as is fitting in the Lord." Pretty short verse, but probably one of the most famous and detailed teachings, descriptions of God's vision for a godly wife in scripture comes from Proverbs 31. You're probably familiar with Proverbs 31, the Proverbs 31:10 says, "An excellent wife who can find. She's far more precious than jewels. The heart of her husband trusts in her and he will have no lack of gain. She does him good and not harm all the days of her life. She seeks wool and flax and works with willing hands. She's like the ships of the merchant bringing her food from afar. She rises while it's yet night and provides food for her household in portions for her maidens. She considers a field and buys it. With the fruit of her hands, she plants a vineyard. She dresses herself with strength and makes her arms strong. She perceives that her merchandise is profitable. Her lamp does not go out at night. She puts her hand to the distaff and her hands hold the spindle. She opens her hand to the poor and reaches out her hands to the needy. She's not afraid of snow for her household, for all of her household are clothed in scarlet. She makes bed coverings for herself and clothing. Her clothing is fine linen and purple. Her husband is known in the gates when he sits among the elders of the land. She makes linen garments and sells them. She delivers sashes to the merchant. Strength and dignity are her clothing. She laughs at the time to come. She opens her mouth with wisdom and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. She looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed. Her husband also and he praises her. Many women have done excellently, but you surpass them all. Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain. But a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Give her the fruit of her hands and let her works praise her in the gates." Long passage. And obviously this is a very idealized vision of what a wife, what mother can be in God's eyes, but that's what God does. He calls us to pursue these ideals of perfection and then he gives us grace for what's real as we work our way towards those ideals. But the point here is if you're in the season of being a wife, of being a mother, and you're trying to figure out what is God calling me to do right now, this is a great place to start. Proverbs 31, it shows us a wife who supports her husband and she cultivates peace and order and beauty in her home. It shows us a mother who loves her children. She's strong, she's hardworking, she's selfless. She's nurturing and wise. It shows us a business woman who is savvy and charitable and resourceful. Most of all, what Proverbs 31 shows us is it shows us a godly woman, a woman who is known at the city gates, not for her beauty, not for her charm. She's known for her kindness, her humility, her generosity, her wisdom. She is known for fearing the Lord. And I pray that God would raise up more strong women like this, but I also just praise God because I know that we have so many strong women like this here at Mosaic. And the big idea here as it relates to our calling is that what scripture shows us is the primary calling of the wife, of the mother, is to create order, to create beauty, to create shalom in her home. And then as she commits herself to this good calling, we see that if God gives her the margin and the opportunity to do so, she may also be called to expand that shalom outside of the home, into the community, into the marketplace. And so the home comes first, it takes priority, but as we see the Proverbs 31 woman, she's selling in the marketplace. She's purchasing real estate, she's planting a vineyard, she's caring for the poor. She's not doing these things to build up herself or her ego or her career. She's not doing these things to escape her home, but she's doing these things to bless her home and to make her home a blessing to others. And this is not easy. This takes hard work, humility, wisdom. And this is going to look different in every household in some ways, right? Husbands and wives need to work together, pursue the Lord together, to discern and to determine where they need to draw those boundaries, where they draw those lines and keep those priorities straight. It takes a lot of wisdom. But verse 26 says that she opens her mouth with wisdom and that the teaching of kindness is on her tongue, that she looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. And as a result, her children call her blessed, her husband praises her. And in the creation story, God's first observation of something less than good, less than perfect is the absence of Eve. That it was not good for Adam to be alone, that he needed help, he needed a support. He needed a help made to come along and to help him fulfill his calling and purpose. And that God said creation was not good without her. He creates Eve and then he gives them the commandment for the two to become one flesh, for them to be fruitful and multiply to fill the earth and subdue it. And God establishes this family unit as the means of fulfilling his cultural mandate. And I say all this to say that motherhood is one of the highest, most vital and most noble callings that a person can have. And it's also one of the hardest. And that's why we as Christians, we need to support the mothers in our lives. Our culture has been degrading marriage, has been degrading motherhood for generations and it is tearing our world apart. And Proverbs 31 tells us that a godly wife, a godly mother, is far more precious than jewels. It's a high calling to be a wife and a mother. And as Christians, we must value and honor the mothers among us even and especially when the culture around us refuses to do so. And so Paul addresses the wives and the mothers. And then he addresses the husbands as well. It says verse 19, he says, "Husbands love your wives and do not be harsh with them." Again, he doesn't give us a lot here. Just one little sentence. If Proverbs 31 is the most famous and detailed description of a godly wife, then I would I'd say that Ephesians chapter five is the most famous and detailed description of a godly husband. And this is the parallel passage that Paul gives us in Ephesians chapter five, verse 25. He starts out the same way. He says, husbands love your wives, but then he continues. He says, "Love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the words so that he might present the church to himself in splendor without spot or wrinkle or any such thing that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it just as Christ does the church because we are members of his body. And then he quotes Genesis, "Therefore, man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." This mystery is profound, and I'm saying it refers to Christ in the church, however, let each one of you love his wife as himself and let the wife see that she respects her husband. If Proverbs 31 asks us an excellent woman who can find, I think what Ephesians five is telling us is this, that bro, if you find her, she's out of your league. You're not going to find the perfect, excellent Proverbs 31 woman. And if you do, she's probably not going to be interested in you. Your job is not to find the perfect wife. Your job is to build the perfect life, to build the perfect marriage, to find a woman who fears the Lord and commit to her. To commit your life, to laying yourself down, to loving her, to cherishing her, to nourishing her with the word of God so that then the two of you can grow old and excellent together, where you're both through this relationship being sanctified into the people that God is calling you to be. Scripture calls moms to cultivate and care for the home. He calls husbands to cultivate the marriage. Husband, God is going to hold us responsible for the health of our marriages and the health of our marriages are going to dictate the health of our families. It's a high calling. Just like Proverbs 31 seems almost unattainable, Ephesians 5, I mean, you're literally being called to love your wife the way Christ loved the church. It's an impossible calling, but God gives us grace where we fail and then he gives us more grace to get up and to keep pursuing that goal, that standard as husbands. And so your wife's calling is to cultivate shalom in the home. And she can only do this as you commit to your primary calling. And husbands your primary calling, your responsibility is that God has called you to provide, to protect, and most importantly, to pastor your wives and children well so that they are loved, so that they are led, so that they are cherished and treasured so that as you do so that they can flourish to do all that God has called them to do. So practically husbands, as you seek to discern your more particular calling, if this is the season of life that you're in, understand that God is going to call you to sacrifice a lot of things for the sake of your marriage and for the sake of your children. He's not going to call you to sacrifice your marriage and your children for anything else that this world has to offer. Not your job, not your ambitions, not your hobbies, not your friends that you as a husband, if this is the season of life that you're in, this is your highest and most important calling. Second only to your calling to be a disciple of Jesus and to be a child of God yourself. And so he gives instructions for husbands and wives and then he begins to talk to children and parents. Verse 20, he says, "Children obey your parents in everything for this pleases the Lord. And fathers do not provoke your children less they become discouraged." So we're all children and we will always be children. And this command, this calling as children, it's going to look different throughout our lives. But the one thing that continues is the calling that we will always be called to honor our fathers and our mothers. And as a young child, you do this through your obedience to your mother and father. As you're an adult, you grow older, you honor your father and mother through the honorable life that you build and live. And then as your parents' age, you may find yourself in a season again where you now need to honor them by sacrificially caring for them the way they sacrificially cared for you. First Timothy 5:3 says, "Honor the widows who are truly widows, but if a widow has children or grandchildren," he says, "Let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and it makes some return to their parents. For this is pleasing in the sight of God." And then in verse eight he says, "But if anyone does not provide for his relatives and especially for the members of his own household, he is denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever." We live in a culture that has devalued motherhood and marriage and children. That's also a culture that devalues the aging and the elderly. And as Christians, this should not be the case. And we should honor our father and mother. And whatever season of life you're in, Paul says that it pleases the Lord when we do this and it doesn't end the day that we turn 18 and go off to college. Actually, some of you college students, you probably need to work a little harder on making sure that your Honor and mom and dad now that you're out on your own and getting that taste of freedom, but it's a commandment that stays with us. And then parents, likewise your relationship to your children, it's going to change throughout the seasons of your life. But the greatest season of influence and responsibility that you have is obviously going to be when your children are young, when they're growing up, when they're under your roof. And so throughout scripture we see Proverbs 22:6 is parents need to train up a child in the way that they should go so that when they're old, they will not depart from it. Deuteronomy 6:4 through seven says here, "Oh, Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all of your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart and you shall teach them diligently to your children." Talk with them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. Just throughout the course of everyday life, you're constantly teaching, discipling your children. Colossians 3, the parallel passage to this is Ephesians 6. And again, Paul expands on it a little bit more there. And he says, "Honor your father and mother for this is the first commandment with a promise that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land." And then he says, "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord." I think one of the things that we wrestle with a lot of times as parents is how do we do this? How do we strike this balance between discipline and instruction on the one hand and not provoking our children to anger? On the other hand, this is something that I've personally been trying to get better at as a father, as a dad. And what I've been learning is one of the most important things you need to do is you need to know what kind of situation you're in and what you're dealing with at every given moment. Because getting the situation wrong is often what leads you to provoking your children to anger rather than giving them the discipline and instruction that they need. And so for example, is the situation that you're dealing with sin. Because if it's sin, then you need discipleship, right? Sin is the child has sinned against the commandment of God, and yeah, they might need discipline and correction, but with that you need to talk about the gospel. We need to talk about how God is holy and God is just and he has instructed us how we ought to live, and that when we sin against him, we need to repent and we need to confess our sins. And that when we do this and come to him, he forgives our sins, he cleanses us of unrighteousness. He takes away our guilt and shame. And he does this because Jesus Christ died on the cross and our place and we need to talk about this with them and pray about that with them. And then when we as parents, I mean I've never done this, but maybe some of you have, when we sin, we have to go to our kids too. If we sin against our kids, say, ask for your forgiveness. I need to pray. I need to repent and model that for our kids. Sin needs discipleship, and disobedience needs discipline. And what's the difference there? Well, sin is you've sinned against God. Disobedience is you've sinned against mom and dad. So the Bible never says, thou shall not run out into the street or play in the parking lot or jump on the furniture or anything like that. But mom and dad say that. We need rules in our household to keep things orderly and peaceful, but we shouldn't confuse those rules with God's rules. And so if there's disobedience, a dishonoring of father and mother, there needs to be correction and discipline, but it's a little bit different situation than if they've sinned against God. Is the situation ignorance? Sometimes kids are just... They're foolish. They're ignorant. They don't know what they don't know. And as parents, it's tempting in those situations to get frustrated and want to correct with discipline where actually what the child in that time needs is instruction. They need guidance. They need help seeing what they can't see. Fourthly, it could be weakness. It's not that they're ignorant, they know the right thing to do, they just aren't quite mature enough to do it or they're having... They're struggling. And again, in those situations, they need encouragement from their parents. It could be mistakes. Somebody's always going to spill the milk. Someone's always going to knock over the lamp. And as parents, it's easy for us to get frustrated and want to lash out in discipline where actually everyone makes some mistakes. And in those times as parents, we got to show sympathy. We got to show compassion. Mistakes need compassion. Six, are they just being annoying? Because if you have kids, you understand this, sometimes they're just like, oh, you're driving me nuts. And it's not that you're doing anything naughty or wrong, it's just that you're a kid. And sometimes kids drive us nuts. They're annoying, they're loud, they're crazy, they're rambunctious. And in those times as parents, sometimes we just need to show patience. We just got to let the kids be kids. And then finally is the situation success? Because let's not forget that too often we get really focused on correcting what's wrong, we forget to celebrate what's right. And success needs celebration. When your kid does something well, they should know that you're pleased that you celebrate that with him. So Paul covers all of these seasons in life, husbands, wives, parents, children. But there is one season that he doesn't cover, and ironically, it's the season that he himself is in. And it's a season that many here in this room today are in as well. So I feel like I should say something about this. The season of singleness in adulthood. We live in a very young city with a lot of young single adults. And so the question is how do we live? What does God call us to in that season? I think Jesus kind of anticipated this because in Matthew 19, he was teaching his disciples about God's high standard for marriage. That marriage is a covenant that is foreign between one man, one woman for a lifetime, that you are committing to one another through thick and thin, till death do you part. And he says to them in verse nine, Matthew 19:9, "Whoever divorces his wife except for sexual immorality and marries another commits adultery." And his disciples said to him, "If such is the case of a man with his wife, it's better to not marry." They thought this seems like an impossible standard. And he said to them, "Not everyone can receive the same, but only those to whom it is given. For, there are eunuchs who have been made so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this, receive it." Now, obviously Jesus isn't talking literally here, but I think what he's getting at is that there's going to be some people who for a variety of reasons, either can't get married or won't get married, not due to no fault of their own, perhaps they even have the desire to be married, but it just doesn't happen. But then he also says there's going to be some people who choose for themselves to forego marriage for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Well, Paul was one such person. In First Corinthians 7, he talks about this. First Corinthians 7:6, he says, "Now, as a concession, not a command, as a concession, I say this, that I wish that all were as I myself am speaking of his singleness, but each has his own gift from God, one of one kind, one of another." So Paul says, "I'm giving this as a concession." This is not necessarily the ideal situation, but in a fallen world, what he's saying is that while it might be ideal, it might not be ideal for a person to remain single. In a fallen world, singleness is redeemable by God's grace. And in God's grace, this concession, as Paul describes, it can also be described as a gift. And it might not be a gift that you wanted, might not be a gift that you asked for, but he goes on in verse 32 to explain why it should be viewed in that manner. Verse 32, he says, "Because I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife." And then verse 35, just to make it clear, he says, "I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord." And so if that is the season that you're in, you're an adult and you're in the season of singleness, just a couple of things I want you to know. First, it's a unique calling and Paul says, it can be viewed as a gift and it's one that you share with the apostle Paul himself. Secondly, if you are single and you find in yourself a strong desire for a godly marriage, don't feel guilty about that. That is a very good desire. And if you have that desire and it hasn't been fulfilled, you should persistently pray and prepare and pursue yourself for marriage unless God has made it abundantly clear to you that he is calling you to remain unmarried. And along the way, if you have that desire and there are factors outside of your control keeping you from being married as you desire to be, don't lose heart. Ultimately, no, marriage is not going to give you the ultimate satisfaction in life that you're looking for. It's not going to scratch that itch, that ultimately you can only find that in Jesus Christ and in your relationship with him. And then thirdly, in your singleness, know that you are not being sidelined. That on the one hand, God has a very good purpose in marriage and we should not undermine that. Obviously our culture is, and even some spheres of Christianity, it feels like that's being undermined and that should not be the case. God has a very good purpose in marriage that it is a picture of the gospel and it is the means by which he ordained the cultural mandate to be fulfilled. But as we see here, God has a good redeeming purpose in singleness too. And so Paul says, what is that? He says, you're free from the anxieties of marriage and parenthood. And there there's a lot of anxieties, a lot of responsibilities that come with marriage and with parenthood. He says, you're free from those anxieties in order to be anxious about the things of the Lord, that in your singleness you have a greater bandwidth and capacity for ministry, for serving others, for building friendships in the church, for blessing and building up the household of God. And so to summarize, like unless God has clearly called you to remain single, you should pray and you should pursue marriage. And while you're single, make sure that you steward that gift well. And then through all of it, you need to rest and find your ultimate satisfaction in Jesus Christ. So these are the seasonal callings, and these callings are going to affect the way that we approached the final calling that we're talking about today, which is point number three, committing to our particular calling because in verse 22, Paul shifts. Again, he's talked about God's household, he's talked about our household, and now he begins to talk about what we might call like the workplace career, vocation, things like that. In verse 22, he says, "Bond servants obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye surface as people pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever you do, work hardily as for the Lord and not for men. Knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. For the wrong doer will be paid back for the wrong he's done. And there is no partiality. Masters treat your bond servants justly and fairly knowing that you also have a master in heaven." And so the general principle is in the workplace, whether you are an employee, an employer, you're the boss, the manager, whatever you are, that you need to first of all be treating the people that you work with, with dignity, with honor, with respect, and you need to be working hard. You need to be working as if Jesus Christ were your boss. And Paul says actually that is the truth that you are serving the Lord when you are at work. And with this, one of the reasons that I think many Christians struggle when it comes to sensing God's calling for discerning God's will for them in this area, they get anxious about what is God's will for my life in this area. Well, I think one of the reasons is that too often we as Christians, we start in the wrong place. We tend to want to start with this, with what is my particular specific calling in life? And then we kind of try to build our faith, our family, our church, things like that around that. And scripture tells us, you got to do the opposite. You need to seek first the kingdom of heaven and then all of these other things will be added unto you as well. And the point is not that God is unconcerned with our careers or our vocations, the point is that God is just... He is far less concerned with your career that he is with your character and with your holiness. And so before we kind of complete this discernment of our particular callings, scripture makes it very clear what God's will is for us. First Thessalonians 4 tells us this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality, that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor. Not in the passions of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God, that no one transgress and wrongs his brother in this manner because the Lord is an adventure of all these things. As we told you beforehand and solemnly warns you, for God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. Therefore, whoever disregards this disregards not man but God who gives his Holy Spirit to you. And he goes on in verse nine, he says, "Now, concerning brotherly love, we have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God, how to love one another for that indeed is what you're doing to all the brothers throughout Macedonia. But we urge you brothers to do this more and more and to aspire to live quietly and to mind your own affairs and to work with your hands as we instructed you so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one. It's a very simple view of God's will for us to just live quiet, godly lives. And we need to understand that more than anything, this is God's desire for us, is our holiness, is our sanctification. And so I picture this process, it's kind of like looking through the lenses of a telescope. And so the first lens, you begin looking through the lens of the general calling that we talked about that before anything that I know that I have been called to love the Lord with all my heart, soul, mind, strength, that I've been called to commit myself to the body of Christ, to the local church, to live a holy life, to grow in sanctification. Anything that God calls me to do in life, it needs to pass through that lens first. And then the second lens is that seasonal calling that we talked about, that I need to ask myself, what are my commitments? What responsibilities has God assigned to me in this seasonal life? Because again, anything else that he's calling me to do, it needs to pass through that lens as well. And when you bring those two together, that's when you begin to kind of be a frame and focus God's particular calling on your life right now. And so how do you take that last step of framing, of focusing God's particular calling? What is he calling you to do right now? Well, I don't think there there's any one right thus sayeth the Lord way to do this. There's no chapter in the Bible that clearly says this is how you discern God's will. But I do think that there's many principles throughout scripture that you can bring together that are helpful. And so I'm going to share just something that I know many people have used, that I myself have used for many years at many times to help me discern God's will, to help me discern what God has been calling me to do in particular seasons of life. Because never in my life have I heard the audible voice of God come down and say, "This is what I want you to do." But I have used this filter on several occasions to help me discern what God's been calling me to do. And it has in the past it's never let me down. I call this the diagram of discernment. So my wife made this cool graphic for us. We all love our Venn diagrams here in Boston. You get the idea. You got the five circles, and what you're looking for is that sweet spot in the middle where they all overlap and come together in agreement. And so you see the first one there is you got to consider your convictions. You got to consider your gifting, your opportunities, your character wise counsel. And when all of those come together, well, that's what you're looking for. So first of all, consider your convictions. What has God put on your heart? Is there something that you're passionate about, something that you're burdened for, something that you feel like you ought to do, that you need to do to be faithful to the Lord? This is a good place to start. It's a good indication of God's calling. It's a good place to start. It's not a great place to finish though because scripture tells us that our hearts are deceitful and wicked, and our feelings often lead us astray. And so we can't just say, well, this is what I feel, and so this is what God's calling me to do, but our convictions, they're a good place to start. We need to go beyond that though. So we also need to consider our gifting. If you're passionate about something, if you feel God's put something on your heart, are you skilled and equipped to do something about it? If God is calling you to sing on the praise team and you're tone deaf and you have no rhythm, well, I'm sorry, but I don't think that's the voice of the Lord. You might be called to serve in a variety of other ways. It just might not be that. And that's okay. You got to consider though, am I gifted? Is this what God's wired and gifted and equipped me to do? Maybe I can't do this. Maybe there's another way that I can find to support this thing, but consider your gifting. Third, consider your opportunities. Something you're passionate about, you feel skilled, equipped to do something about it. The next thing you need to ask is there a legitimate need for this? Are there opportunities for me to use my gifts in a way that's going to be helpful, that's going to glorify God, that's going to help others consider your opportunities. Fourth, consider your character. Understand that God is never going to call you. He's never going to call for your ambitions or your influence to outgrow your integrity, to outgrow your character. That you might have big, big plans to do great, great things, but if your life is all tangled up in sin and you're living this double secret life of hypocrisy, well, God's going to call you to work on your heart before he calls you to go and work on anything else. And then fifth is to consider wise counsel. You're passionate about something, you're skilled and you're equipped to do something about it. You've got opportunities. You feel like your character, your heart are in the right place. The final, and probably I'd say this is the most important step, is to bring that sense of calling. Present it to other spirit-filled godly brothers and sisters in Christ. Say, hey, what do you think about this? God's put this on my heart. This is something I've been sensing. Do you agree? Right? Does it seem good to you and to the Holy Spirit that this is what God... And if all of these things line up, well, that's a pretty good indication that this is what God is calling you to do in your life right now. If they don't, there's red flags that come up along the way. Well, maybe you need to take some more time, spend some more time considering, discerning to figure out what's next. But just that's a helpful resource that I've used. I think it'll be helpful for you as well as you commit to your particular calling. And once you figure it out, commit to it, work hardily at it with all of your might in a way that glorifies God. Finally, point number four today is commit to receive inheritance in heaven and leave a legacy on earth. Just one more quick reminder before we wrap out. Whatever season of life you're in right now, whatever particular calling that God has placed on your life, whatever that is, whatever you do, verse 23 says, work hardily as for the Lord and not for men. Knowing that from the Lord, you'll receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. First Corinthians 7:17 says, "Only that each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all of the churches." And so my hope and my prayer is that whatever it is that God has assigned you to do, whatever he is calling you to do, that he would make that clear. That as that becomes clear, that you would commit to do that with all of your mights, so that as you approach that day, when you're coming to the end of your life, you can do so with just a fearless confidence and hope that your life has not been wasted, that it has not been meaningless, that you have fulfilled your purpose in life, that you have done what God created and called you to do. And so that as you reach that goal, you do so, and you're able to just look back on the legacy that you are about to leave and look forward to the inheritance that you are about to receive. And this is not just my prayer for you, it's my hope for you, but this is God's will for you as well. So I'm going to close by reading the benediction, the closing verses from the book of Hebrews. Hebrews chapter 13 verses 20 through 21 say this. This is now. "May the God of peace who brought again from the dead, our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep by the blood of the eternal covenant equip you with everything good that you may do his will. Working in us, that which is pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen." Let's pray. Father, the we thank you that you have not left us to wander aimlessly through this life like sheep without a shepherd, but you have sent your son Jesus Christ, our good shepherd, to bring us into your fold, to love us, to lead us into good pastures of abundant life. Lord, I pray that you would help us to see your good purposes and plans for us, and to give our lives to those things with all of our might. Lord, if any of us lacks discernment, if any of us are uncertain of what you're calling us to do, I pray that you would fill them with wisdom, with your Holy Spirit, surround them by wise council and help them come to know your good, your pleasing, your perfect will. And Lord, if there's anyone here today that still feels lost and wandering outside of your fold, Jesus, I pray our good shepherd, that you would lead them home, that you would seek them, that you would save them today and bring them back into the fold of God. And for all of us, Lord, we pray that you would help us to live lives that bring your name the most glory, that do others the most good, and that leave a legacy of faithfulness and godliness that will impact generations to come for the sake of your kingdom and glory. Lord, we love you, we worship you, and we just want to sing your praises together right now. In Jesus Christ's name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Committed to Worship

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 5, 2023 51:17


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaic boston.com. Today, we are continuing in our sermon series Essential. We've been talking about the essential habits, or sorry, sermon series committed talking about the essential habits of an abundant life. We've been focusing on just the super practical commitments that every Christian that needs to make in order to grow in their faith, persevere in their faith, and experience the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give. Last week we talked about the topic of prayer. This week, we're talking about the topic of worship. If you're here last week as we were talking about prayer, I asked everyone at the beginning, before we start, everyone just take a moment and do an evaluation of your prayer life and rate yourself like on a scale of 1 to 10. Not going to do that here this morning. If we were to rate ourselves on our ability to worship, I already know we would all be a perfect 10. We are very skilled at worshiping. It just comes natural to us and we're going to be talking a little bit more about that. Remember, there's the old Chris Tomlin song, you and I were made for worship, love that song. It's true, he's right, we were designed for worship and we are naturally very good at it. Just look at any like sporting event, look at any rock concert, think about this, think about there's crowds of people, the lights, the loud music, the energy, the excitement, the lasers, the fog, it sounds just like something out of the book of Revelation. If you look at and think, read the descriptions of God's throne in the Book of Revelation, and there's crowds of people, great multitudes of people surrounding his throne, cheering, singing his praise, and there's smoke and there's thunder, and there's lightning. It's this multisensory experience. I do not think that this is a coincidence. We humans are going to find a way to worship one way or another, one thing or another. The problem is not that we don't worship. The problem that we see is that we all too often, we worship the wrong things or we worship in the wrong way. We try to replicate or fabricate the transcendent. Our concern today is not so much with committing to worship generally. Our concern today is with committing to worship properly, to worship the one true God in the way that he commands us to worship. How does that make you feel that God commands you to worship him? For a lot of us that it doesn't, we don't really like to hear that. We don't like to think about a God who commands people to worship him. It makes us uncomfortable to think that God is committed to his own glory, that he is devoted to his worship, but he is. Remember the 10 Commandments, Exodus 20, the first 4 out of the 10 are all about worship. Now, this is what it says, Exodus 20:1. "God spoke all these words saying, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them for I the Lord your God, am a jealous God." "Visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments." God is jealous for us. He commands us to worship him alone. If this feels odd to us, if this irks us, if we bristle at this, well it's because if God were anything like us, such a commandment would seem pretty arrogant and it would be evil. What if God were as scripture tells us not like us? What if he was completely other? What if he was holy? What if God were truly perfect in holiness, justice, mercy, love and power? What if he truly had no rival, no equal for his glory? Well, if this were true and it is true, well then it would not be evil for God to command people to worship him. Actually, it would be evil for God to do anything less than to seek his own glory because he truly is the only one worthy of praise. A truly loving God would insist on this because a truly loving God would be devastated to see the objects of his love and creation settle for worshiping anything less. Jonathan Edwards famous New England theologian pastor, he wrote this, he said, "God, in seeking His glory seeks the good of His creatures because the emanation of his glory, which He seeks and delights in as He delights in Himself and His own eternal glory, implies the communicated excellency and happiness of His creatures." "In communicating His fullness for them, He does it for Himself because of their good, which He seeks their good, which he seeks is so much in union and communion with himself. God is their good, their excellence and happiness is nothing but the emanation and expression of God's glory. God in seeking their glory and happiness seeks Himself and in seeking himself as diffused and expressed, which he delights in as he delights in His own beauty and fullness, He seeks their glory and happiness." You know what I think of when I read something like that? I think I'm so thankful that people don't write like that anymore. What on earth is Jonathan Edwards talking about? Well, I sat down, I chewed on this, I thought about it for a week for a little bit, had a migraine for like three days, but I got through it. This is what I think he's saying. Think of it like this, imagine that there's two men desiring the same woman's hand in marriage pursuing her. Now, the first man is strong, he's handsome, he's intelligent, he's successful, wealthy, compassionate, brave. He is everything that a woman could ever desire in a man. More than that, he loves her with all of his heart. He cherishes her, he treasures her. He would do anything for her, even lay down his own life if she were ever in danger. That's bachelor number one. Bachelor number two is a criminal. He's a predator looking for someone to use an abuse. He's a violent, unscrupulous, selfish, deadbeat, ugly loser living in his mom's basement, trolling people on the internet all day. He's got food stuck in his beard. He's got Cheetos dust on his fingers just 24/7. Would it be wrong for the honorable man to defend his honor in this situation? Would it be wrong for him to insist that this woman that he loves value his virtues and even despise the vice of this other man to, in a sense, seek his own glory even to the point of demanding that she stay away from this dangerous predator. That would not be wrong. In seeking his own glory, the honorable man is actually seeking his beloveds good. Now, this is not a perfect illustration because we cannot imagine a perfect man. There are no perfect men except of course for Jesus Christ, and that's the point. We take the premise of this illustration, times it by an infinitely glorious and perfect God. Then, you begin to understand what Edwards means. God is love, and the most loving thing God can therefore do is pursue his glory because the glory of the creator is the good of the creation. In commanding us to worship God, he is commanding our joy. He is commanding our greatest good that to command us to worship him is like commanding a bird to fly free in the sky. To command us not to worshiping anything else is like commanding a fish to stay away from the desert. He he's doing what is best for us in seeking his own glory. If you have your Bibles open up to John 4, we're going to be looking at a story today that is really a case study in what we've just talked about that shows us how and why this is so true. How important it is that we worship and that we worship the right God in the right way. John 4 is the story of the woman at the well. In this story, Jesus gives us what is arguably the most important teaching on worship that we have in all of holy scripture. If you have your Bibles, you can follow along. The words are also going to be up here on the screen. This is John 4, beginning in verse one. "Now, when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although he himself did not baptize but only his disciples, he left Judea and departed again for Galilee, and he had to pass through Samaria. He came to a town of Samaria called Sychar near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, so Jesus wearied as he was from his journey was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour, a woman from Samaria came to draw water and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink. For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food." The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me a woman of Samaria for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans." Jesus answered her. If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, "Give me a drink." You would've asked him and he would've given you living water." The women said to him, "Sir, you have nothing to draw water with. The well is deep, where are you going to get the living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drink from it himself as it sons in his livestock. Jesus said to her again, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him, he'll never be thirsty again." "The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water welling of to eternal life. The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirst or have to come here to draw water." Jesus said to her, "Go call your husband and come here." The woman answered him, "I have no husband." Jesus said to her, "You are right in saying I have no husband, for you have had five husbands. The one you now have is not your husband. What you have said it's true." The woman said to him, "Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our father's worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship." Jesus said to her, woman, "Believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father, you worship what you do not know." "We worship what we know for salvation is from the Jews, but the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the father and spirit and truth. For the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship and spirit and truth." The women said to him, "I know that the Messiah is coming. He is called the Christ. When he comes, he will tell us all things." Jesus said to her, "I who speak to you am He." This is the reading of God's word for us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? Father, help us to become to be the worshipers that you are seeking. Teach us to worship in spirit and in truth, God, give us a glimpse of your glory that stirs our hearts and affections with all and wonders so that we cannot help but to declare your praise. That we cannot help but to offer our lives as a living sacrifice and worship to you, to give you glory in all that we say and do. Lord, speak to us now we pray through your holy word. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, it's been a while since we've done a traditional three-point sermon and we're going to do one of those this morning. The three points of our sermon today are this, that point number one that the father is seeking worshipers, 0.2, who will worship in spirit in the truth, and 0.3 is both in Word and in deed. Jesus tells us that the father is seeking worshipers, John 4:23, he says, "The hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the father in spirit and truth for the Father is seeking such people to worship him." We already talked about how this is not wrong or selfish for God to do, to seek worshipers to pursue his own glory. This story is really a case study and why that's true, to help us to see all of the ramifications that come along with this. Jesus tells the woman, he says, "You worship what you do not know." As you read the context, it becomes clear that Jesus, he is not just talking about this theological feud that was going on between the Jews and Samaritans. That was certainly part of what Jesus was talking about, but he's pressing into something far deeper, far more personal for this woman at the well. The first thing he says is, "Hey, go call your husband." Well, he knows full well that she has no husband. As she says, "I've had five, the person I'm now with is not my husband." This is where Jesus goes because he knows that this is the temple that they're arguing about. This is the temple where she had been worshiping. This is the idol that has a hold of her heart that for so many years this woman has been searching for a Messiah among mortals. Bouncing from man to man to man, hoping to find satisfaction for her soul, through intimacy, through sex, and it's destroying her life. This is the irony of idolatry that our idols, they promise to satisfy the deepest longings of our heart. Then, the more we draw from those wells, the more we drink of that water, the thirstier we become. Instead of satisfaction, she finds a life of sin and shame. She finds a life of heartache, humiliation, a life of regret. Jesus, he preemptively addressed this in verse 13, this is what he is talking about when he says, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again." He's not talking about water, he's talking about her. He's talking about her life. He's talking about the futility of her idolatry, trying to find her hope or peace or satisfaction in something lesser than God. One of the reasons that we may be cringed at the idea of God's seeking worshipers, of being devoted to his glory is because we simply, we fail to understand how good God is on the one hand, but then we also fail to really fully understand how futile and how deadly idolatry and sin are on the other. This woman's idols, they were destroying her life. The prophet Jeremiah in Jeremiah 2:12, it says, "Be appalled, O heavens at this. Be shocked and utterly desolate declares the Lord. For my people have committed two evils, they have forsaken me. The fountain of living waters and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water." There's so much more going on in this story than just conversation about a well and it's water. Jesus is talking about the idols in her heart. This is why when we look at scripture and we look at the topic of idolatry, we also see accompanied with that the topic of God's wrath, that God has wrath. His wrath burns against our idolatry. He hates it with a passion because he loves us with a passion because he sees what it does to us, that our idols come and they offer us the world, but then they kill, they steal, they destroy. They take away everything. Our dignity, the glory that we were created for as image bearers of God. One of the most just brutally clear teachings of this in all of scripture comes from Romans chapter one, Romans 1:18, Paul writes this. He says, "The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness, suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them." For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and His divine nature have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made, so they're without excuse." For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened, claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals, and creeping things. "Therefore, God gave them up and the lusts of their hearts to impurity and to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served creature, the creature rather than the creator who was blessed forever. You see what Paul's getting at? You see what's going on here. It's this idea that in giving our glory to anything other than God, we're not robbing God of His glory. God is infinitely perfect in His glory. We cannot add to or subtract from God's glory, from His splendor, but when we give our glory to anything lesser than God, we are robbing ourselves. We are in a sense giving away our dignity, giving away our humanity. We exchange wells of living water for broken, empty cisterns. We exchange living in the truth for living a life of lies. We exchange wisdom for folly, honor for shame, dignity for a debased life. We exchange the glory of the creator for created things. The big idea is that in this exchange, we ourselves are being changed. That we are becoming like whatever it is that we behold in worship. Now, as image bearers of God, we were created to behold God in worship and to grow in more glory of his likeness. The 2 Corinthians 3:17 Paul talks about this says that, "The Lord is the spirit and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. We all with unveiled faces beholding the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. That this is what happens when we worship the right God in the right way, we're growing increasing degrees of glory. When we fail to do that, the opposite is true as well. We become less like him and more like creation. We begin to behave like animals, like the creeping things that we worship. We begin to become controlled by our fleshly impulses. We become increasingly inhumane. We become increasingly consumed by dishonorable passions. This is exactly what Paul says as he continues in verse 26. He says, "For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchange natural relations for those that are contrary to nature. The men likewise, gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another." "Men committing shameless acts with men in receiving in themselves to do penalty for their error. Since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with alt manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They're full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness, their gossips, slanders, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless." "Though they know that God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them, but they give approval to those who practice them." It's chilling how much it feels like this is just becoming more and more the state of our world every day. We shouldn't be surprised because this is the natural end of idolatry. This is the horrifying end of misdirected worship. By rejecting the God of heaven, we are inviting hell on earth. This is the reason that a good and loving God is jealous for us, and even angry when we do not give him the glory that He deserves because he knows idolatry always leads to death, it always invites hell. Right now, this hell on earth is temporary and it is escapable by the power of the gospel, by the blood of Jesus Christ there can be redemption and forgiveness of sins. What we see is that a day is coming when those who refuse to repent and refuse to worship God as they are, will find themselves not just experiencing a hell on earth but existing in a hell for all of eternity. This should break our hearts, the scripture describes hell as a place of unbearable conscience, eternal selfishness, and suffering. Where people are forever cut off from the presence of God's glory. This is 1 Thessalonians 2:9, it says, "They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction away from away from the presence of the Lord and the glory of his might when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, to be marveled, that among all who have believed Jesus is coming." This is true, and we may bristle at this. We may not want to talk about it, but it's true. We know that it's true because we see the warning signs of it all around us in our world right now. This is why Jesus runs into this woman at the well. He doesn't talk about the weather. He's not there to shoot the breeze just to carry on a casual conversation. He goes straight to the most off limit, sensitive, dark part of her life and says, "I want to talk about that." Why would he do that? He did that because he loved her because this was the idol that was destroying her life. The only way for her to live was for it to die. He goes there and that this couldn't have been fun, it couldn't have been easy to do, but he could see the eternal destruction of her idolatry was already having effect in her present life and he wanted to pull her from those flames before it was too late. He goes there, love compels him to talk about this. He couldn't stand to see her any longer returning day after day to the well of her sin, of her shame, of her sin, of her idolatry, hopelessly drawing water that was never going to quench. The application for us right now, this story it's not just about her, it's about us. What is that well that broken cistern in your life, are you holding on to any idols? Maybe you go to them occasionally, maybe you go to them habitually. Are you looking to created things to find your comfort, your hope, your peace, your joy and happiness and life? Jesus tells us in verse 13 says, listen, "Everyone who drinks of this water, they're going to be thirsty again. It's never going to satisfy you, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." Verse 10, he says, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that saying to you, "Give me a drink, you'd have asked him and he would've given you this living water." The woman responds on verse 15, he says, "Sir, give it to me. Give me this water so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water. It's a beautiful glorious thing to know that the father is seeking worshipers. He's seeking people who will draw water from the well of Christ and extinguish the flames of their idols and find their satisfaction, everything that their hearts have longed for are satisfied in him. Jesus first tells us that the father is seeking worshipers. He also tells us that the kind of worshipers that the father is seeking, and verse 23 says that the hour is coming and it is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. For the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth. This is point number two today that we worship in spirit and truth. Romans 1, John 4, Exodus 20, they all tell us how important it is that we worship the right God. They also tell us how important it's that we worship him in the right way. The right way, and that Jesus tells us is to worship him in spirit and truth. What does that mean to worship God in spirit and truth? I think the truth part comes a little bit easier. That part's not too difficult to understand that to worship in truth means that we must worship God for who He truly is. We do not worship God as we imagine Him to be. We do not worship Him for who we hope or we desire Him to be. We worship Him for who He has revealed himself to be, that He has revealed himself through His word. He's told us what He's like and how He ought to be worshiped through the living word that's Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and through the written word, holy scripture, that's how we know God. Today, Hebrews 1 says, "Long ago and many times, and in many ways God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. In these last days, he has spoken to us by His son whom He appointed the heir of all things through whom He also created the world. He, Jesus, the Son, is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature. He upholds the universe by the word of his power. John began his gospel, John chapter 1, he says, "In the beginning was the word and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him was not anything made that has been made and Him was life and that life was the light of men. Then in verse 14, and he says, "This word became flesh and he dwells among us. We have seen His glory, the glory as the only son from the Father who is full of grace and truth." This is what it means to worship in truth that our understanding of God and how we worship him, it's not something we find by looking inwardly into ourselves. It is something that we can only find and discover by looking to the truth that God has revealed to us through his word, through the living word, Jesus Christ and through his written word of holy scripture. We must worship in truth, but we also must worship in spirit. What does it mean to worship in spirit? Well, if you're familiar with John's gospel, when John talks about the spirit, he's almost always talking about the Holy Spirit and the gift or the indwelling Holy Spirit that is going to come upon Jesus of followers, that to worship in spirit, it does not require us to go to a holy temple, it requires us to have the Holy Spirit. Jesus talked about this in chapter three with Nicodemus, how you need to be born again by the Spirit. This is why Jesus tells the Samaritan woman, "Listen, the time is coming in. It's here right now. It's not going to matter whether you worship God here or there at this mountain or that temple, what's going to matter is that you have the Holy Spirit of God within you." Last week, when we talked about prayer, we talked about how prayer is this Trinitarian experience of Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. The same is true of worship, that we worship in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the truth of Jesus Christ and spirit and in truth. That is part of it that we must worship with the Spirit in the Spirit as those who have been born again by the Holy Spirit. Now, in addition to this, I think Jesus just to make it practical, when we talk about worshiping in his spirit and truth, the idea here is that it goes beyond just our understanding and our mind, and it produces a proper posture in our hearts. It produces a right attitude and a right affection for God in our hearts when we have the right understanding and when we have the right spirit within us, that these two things together then result in a proper response to God in praise. Throughout scripture, the way people respond to God, we express this. It's through love, it's through our obedience, it's through sacrifice, and it is through praise. It's through the words that we say, and we're going to talk a little bit here in a little bit about how therefore worship really in includes every aspect of our life. One of the most natural ways for us to express this to God all at once is through singing to him with Psalm, with music. Psalm 108:1 says, "I will sing and make melody to God with my lips? No, he says, "With all of my being. Awake, O, harp and lyre. I will wake the dawn, I will give thanks to you, oh Lord, among the peoples, and I'll sing your praises to you among the nations for your stud fast love is great above the heavens. Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds that when we sing, we sing with our whole being. Have you ever stopped to think about why we sing in church? It is just normal, but when you think about it's strange. People usually don't just sing. I said in the newsletter, people pretty much they sing when they're drunk or they sing when they're in love. That's the reason we sing. Hopefully, you're not drunk, but we sing because we love. We sing because we can't contain the feeling, the affection that we have for God our Father as we think about who he is and as we think about what he has done for us. There is a unique and at times transcendent wholeness that is produced when words and music come together. When we sing, we have a message of truth that we are engaging with our minds. The words that we sing matter, but then how we sing them matters as well. This message in our minds that stirs up evokes emotions in our heart. Then, we engage our whole body, we sing out loud, we move, we clap our hands, we raise our arms. Whatever we do that we sing in sync, we sing in rhythm, we sing with dynamics and harmony. The music moves because it is meant to move us. It is meant to be this whole body multisensory experience. The point that I'm trying to make is that our praise should not be rote. It should not be half-hearted, apathetic, indifferent. It should not seem boring or stale. Our praise should be the passionate response of hearts that have been set on fire by the glory of God. It's the response of hearts that have properly understood just how beautiful and glorious and worthy of praise God really is. Psalm 33 says, "Shout for joy in the Lord. O, you righteous. Praise benefits the upright. Give thanks to the Lord with the lyre. Make melody to him with the harp of 10 strings. Sing to him a new song, play skillfully on the strings with loud shouts. For the word of the Lord is upright, and all of his work is done in faithfulness. He loves righteousness and justice, and the earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord." Psalm 47:1 says, "Clap your hands, all people. Shout to God with loud songs of joy. For the Lord, the Most High is to be feared, a great king over all the earth. Psalm 150 says, "Praise the Lord. Praise God in his sanctuary. Praise him in his mighty heavens. Praise him for his mighty deeds. Praise him according to his excellent greatness. Praise him with the trumpet sound, praise him with the lute and harp. Praise him with tambourine and dance and praise him with strings and pipe. Praise him with sounding cymbals. Praise him with the loud crashing cymbals." That's Caleb's new life verse as he's learning to play the drums. Let everything that has breath, praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Then, Ephesians 5:14 says, "Therefore awake, wake up, O, sleeper and arise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. Look carefully then how you live, not as unwise, but as wise, making the most best use of the time because the days are evil."Not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is, and do not get drunk with wine for that is debauchery, but be filled with the spirit addressing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart. Giving thanks always and for everything to God, the Father, and the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." If a father is seeking worshipers, who will worship him in spirit and in truth, not sluggishly, not with apathy, not half asleep, but fully wide awake to his glory, responding just with passionate, affectionate, transcendent expressions of thanksgiving and praise. We are to worship the Father in spirit and in truth. Then, point number three today is that we must also worship him both in word and deed. Worship is not anything less than what we give God as we sing his praise together, but it is obviously a whole lot more than that. Worship is a lifestyle of obedience and love to God. The Father is seeking worshipers who will worship in spirit and in truth, and therefore worship him both in word and deed. We have a great example of this in our story today. We have a great example in both in Jesus Christ and in the woman at the well as she responds to him. I didn't read this part earlier, but we're going to read a little bit more of the story right now because after Jesus reveals himself to her as the Messiah, the next thing we're told is we're told what's happened next. In verse 27. It says, "Then, his disciples came back and they marveled that he was talking with a woman and no one said, what do you seek or why are you talking with her? The woman left your water jar and went away into the town and said to the people, "Come and see a man who told me everything that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?" Now, I want to just stop and back up there for a moment because this didn't even hit me until I was looking over my notes and reading meditating of the text this morning. It tells us that the disciples show up and the woman takes off and she leaves and she leaves her what? She leaves her water jar. She leaves that thing that symbolizes the idol that had a hole on her life for so long. The thing that they were talking about that, but they weren't really talking about. She leaves it there and she runs into that town because she has to tell everyone, "Come and see the man who told me everything I ever did. Can this be to Christ?" They went out of the town and they were coming to him. Now, meanwhile, the disciples were urging him saying, "Rabbi, eat." He said to them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about." The disciples said to one another, "Has anyone brought him something to eat?" Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say there are yet four months, and then comes the harvest. Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life so that the sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, one sows another reaps I sent you to reap for that for which you did not labor others have labored and you have entered into their labor. He's referring to all the people of the town that are now coming out to see him, to hear and to receive the gospel. It says that as they did verse 39, many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony. She told them, "He told me all that I ever did." When the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them. He stayed there for two days and many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, "It's no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves." We know that this indeed is the savior of the world. That true worship, as we see here, it cannot be confined to a time, a place, a song, a service. True worship is a lifestyle of obedience, of praise, of testifying to the grace of Jesus Christ in our life. This is what Jesus did, this is what the woman does. Romans 12:1 says, "I appeal to you, therefore brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as living sacrifices holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship." That true worship. It is the entirety of our lives given as a living sacrifice to the glory of God. Verse 34, Jesus says, this is why he says, "My food, I don't need the bread that you went into town to give me because my food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish His work." That Jesus' purpose in life was to glorify the Father, not just in the songs that he sang as they traveled around or they attended a synagogue or temple together, that was certainly a part of it. Jesus' purpose was to glorify the Father in all that He said, all that He did, because for him, this was more satisfying to Jesus than even bread for an empty stomach. That's true of Jesus, and it also proved true of the woman at the well. She now, as Jesus says, "I have bread that you don't even know about. She has water that they don't even know about. She's goes to go tell everyone about it because her drink is now to do the will of the one who has sent her. She runs into the town and she begins to tell everybody that she had come to the well that day, thirsty, and she had left satisfied. She had come there in shame and she had left in honor. She had come there with all of her regrets about the past, and she left with a vision and a purpose for her future. She arrived in disgrace and she left in God's grace. She arrived at her broken cistern, but she leaves her water jar there. She runs into the village to tell everyone that she had found the living water that her soul had been looking for, that this woman who had lived a life of shame about everything that she ever did, was now willing to go and face those people and say, "Come and see the man who told me everything I ever did. That her reputation, her story had not become her testimony." You have to think about this, the reason that she was out there at, well, in the middle of the day, in the heat of the day, the reason she bumped into Jesus in the first place, well, it's because she wasn't there when she was supposed to be there. She wasn't there when all the other women of the village would've been there drawing their water in the cool of the day. The reason she wasn't there, because she was intentionally didn't want to be there, she was avoiding them. She was ashamed to show her face among the other women of the village because she had a reputation. She didn't want to go and see the sideways glances and hear the whispering gossip or the snide passive-aggressive remarks. She had a shameful reputation. But Jesus had redeemed this, he turned it into her testimony, and now she boldly, she excitedly goes, and she runs into the village. She finds every man, woman, child who will listen to her and she begins to tell them about Jesus, about the living water that she had found, and they all go out to meet him together. This had to have been hard, to go and to face the people that had really probably mistreated and rejected her, treated her as a bit of an outside. She had to forgive them, she had to love them, and she had to go, and she was willing to go. It was the only proper response to the mercy that she had just found in Jesus Christ to go and to face her fears, to face those people and to just boldly tell them the good news about what she had discovered. For the first time in her life, she felt secure. She felt peace, she felt joy. She felt loved that for the first time in her life there in the presence of Jesus, everything began to make sense. She was safe with her savior. She was no longer the woman of five husbands who was now living with her deadbeat boyfriend. That was not her identity anymore. She had been saved by the Christ, the Messiah, she was now a daughter of the king. She was now a child of God, beloved, cherished, redeemed, and her restless heart had finally found its home there in the presence of Jesus Christ, and she was never the same. Saint Augustine wrote in his confessions, "Great art, Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised, great is thy power and of Thy wisdom, there is no end. Thou movest us to delight in praising Thee. For Thou has formed us for Thyself and our hearts are restless until they rest in thee. Oh, how shall I find rest in Thee. Who will send Thee into my heart to inebriate it so that I may forget my woes and embrace Thee as my only good? What art Thou to me have compassion on me that I may speak? What am I to Thee that thou demandest my love, and unless I give it Thee art angry and even threatenest me with great sorrows. Is it then a light sorrow not to love Thee? Alas! Alas! Tell me of Thy compassion, O Lord, my God, what are Thou art to me? Say unto my soul, "I am thy salvation." Speak that I may hear. Behold Lord, the ears of my heart are before the open them Thou them and say, under my soul, "I am thy salvation." When I hear, may I run and lay hold of Thee hide not Thy face for me. Let me die, lest I die if only I may see Thy face." This is a picture of what it looks like to be a living sacrifice. Let me die lest I die. Let me die to myself, let me die to my pride. Let me die to living life for my own glory so that I can find myself fully satisfied in living my life for the glory of God. It's the only thing that's going to satisfy my soul. It's a sacrifice, it's a living sacrifice because we have to give up. We have to give ourselves away, but it's a living sacrifice because we know that as we do in Christ, the well that we are drawing from is a well of living water that will never run dry. We're going to have an opportunity to respond and praise and worship here in a moment. Today, we're doing something special as a church, we are celebrating communion together. Today, we're coming to the Lord's table and communion this is a sacred symbol really, of everything that we have been talking about today, that the true food is the body of Christ. The true drink is the living water that he offers us. In John 6, a few chapters later in verse 53, Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life." Now, obviously, he's not talking about literal flesh and blood here. We know what he's talking about. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks, my blood has eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food and my body is true drink." "Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father. Whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread of the father's ate and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever." The way that we celebrate communion, hopefully, you got one of these as you came in. If not, just raise your hand right now. The ushers would happy to bring you one wherever you're seated. There's a bread in here in the cup here. The bread represents the body of Christ that was broken for us. The cup represents his blood that was poured out to make a new covenant in His blood for the forgiveness of our sins. We will all take this together here in a moment. I'll pray for us and then we will take communion together. If you are here today and you're a Christian, we would welcome you to celebrate communion with us. If you're here today and you're not a Christian, we would ask you to refrain. There's nothing magical about this, it's not going to do anything for you apart from repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. If you're here today and you're a Christian, but you've been living in unrepentant sin while scripture also warns us to not partake of communion in an unworthy manner, that you either refrain or you spend this time right now to confess and to repent of your sin before the Lord and to remember the sacrifice that Jesus made to make that possible. If you do that or if you've committed your life to Christ for the first time today, you've repented and you put your faith in Him, we'd welcome you to join us as we celebrate communion together. Let's pray and then we will take communion together. Father, we come and we confess our sin. We confess our idolatry. We confess that our hearts are not as on fire for you as they should be, but too often that fire is quenched by desires, passions, competing idols for our hearts, so we repent. Help us to see your beauty, your goodness, your glory, and that by the power of the living water of Jesus Christ, that you would just extinguish the flames of these idols that are constantly vying for our attention to live our lives purely devoted to being living sacrifices given for you, knowing that Jesus Christ came to be a dying sacrifice for us, that he truly did go to the death, that his body was given up, his blood was poured out. The full wrath of God for arson fell upon him so that we could be forgiven, we could be reconciled, we could be loved, adopted into your family, and to be called the children of God. We thank you, Jesus for this tremendous sacrifice that you have made. If it's not real to us, Lord, make it real to us right now, that you truly did come in a body of flesh, that you truly did suffer and die. More than that, you experienced the moment as the Father forsook you pouring his wrath out upon you to pay the eternal debt that we could have never paid on our own. Jesus, we thank you, we praise you for that. Not only for that, but for the good news that you did not stay there, but that you rose in victory and triumph over Satan's sin and death, and that you've given us this time now to take this bread in. Take this cup as a way of proclaiming your death until you come again and we look forward to that day when you do. To judge the world in righteousness and to make all things new, to wipe away every tear so we can be there in your presence and your joy forever. Jesus, we thank you. We praise you, we love you. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen. Lord Jesus, on the night that he was betrayed, he took bread after giving thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples. He said, "This is my body given for you. Take, eat, and do this and remembrance of me. He then took the cup said, "This is the cup of the new covenant in my blood. Take drink, do this in remembrance of me." Jesus, we just thank you again for your sacrifice. Father, we thank you for sending your son, the Holy Spirit. We thank you for entering our lives to be that wellspring of living water, cleansing us, sanctifying us, and convicting us, and helping us to grow an ever-increasing glory from one degree to another, more and more like our Savior, Jesus Christ. God, I pray that the reality of who you are and all that you have done, the gravity of that would fall on us now in our minds, but that understanding of the truth would stir our hearts and affections to truly praise you and sing of your glory as we ought, as you deserve to be praised. We love you. We praise you together right now in Jesus' name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Committed to Worship

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 5, 2023 51:17


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaic boston.com. Today, we are continuing in our sermon series Essential. We've been talking about the essential habits, or sorry, sermon series committed talking about the essential habits of an abundant life. We've been focusing on just the super practical commitments that every Christian that needs to make in order to grow in their faith, persevere in their faith, and experience the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give. Last week we talked about the topic of prayer. This week, we're talking about the topic of worship. If you're here last week as we were talking about prayer, I asked everyone at the beginning, before we start, everyone just take a moment and do an evaluation of your prayer life and rate yourself like on a scale of 1 to 10. Not going to do that here this morning. If we were to rate ourselves on our ability to worship, I already know we would all be a perfect 10. We are very skilled at worshiping. It just comes natural to us and we're going to be talking a little bit more about that. Remember, there's the old Chris Tomlin song, you and I were made for worship, love that song. It's true, he's right, we were designed for worship and we are naturally very good at it. Just look at any like sporting event, look at any rock concert, think about this, think about there's crowds of people, the lights, the loud music, the energy, the excitement, the lasers, the fog, it sounds just like something out of the book of Revelation. If you look at and think, read the descriptions of God's throne in the Book of Revelation, and there's crowds of people, great multitudes of people surrounding his throne, cheering, singing his praise, and there's smoke and there's thunder, and there's lightning. It's this multisensory experience. I do not think that this is a coincidence. We humans are going to find a way to worship one way or another, one thing or another. The problem is not that we don't worship. The problem that we see is that we all too often, we worship the wrong things or we worship in the wrong way. We try to replicate or fabricate the transcendent. Our concern today is not so much with committing to worship generally. Our concern today is with committing to worship properly, to worship the one true God in the way that he commands us to worship. How does that make you feel that God commands you to worship him? For a lot of us that it doesn't, we don't really like to hear that. We don't like to think about a God who commands people to worship him. It makes us uncomfortable to think that God is committed to his own glory, that he is devoted to his worship, but he is. Remember the 10 Commandments, Exodus 20, the first 4 out of the 10 are all about worship. Now, this is what it says, Exodus 20:1. "God spoke all these words saying, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them for I the Lord your God, am a jealous God." "Visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments." God is jealous for us. He commands us to worship him alone. If this feels odd to us, if this irks us, if we bristle at this, well it's because if God were anything like us, such a commandment would seem pretty arrogant and it would be evil. What if God were as scripture tells us not like us? What if he was completely other? What if he was holy? What if God were truly perfect in holiness, justice, mercy, love and power? What if he truly had no rival, no equal for his glory? Well, if this were true and it is true, well then it would not be evil for God to command people to worship him. Actually, it would be evil for God to do anything less than to seek his own glory because he truly is the only one worthy of praise. A truly loving God would insist on this because a truly loving God would be devastated to see the objects of his love and creation settle for worshiping anything less. Jonathan Edwards famous New England theologian pastor, he wrote this, he said, "God, in seeking His glory seeks the good of His creatures because the emanation of his glory, which He seeks and delights in as He delights in Himself and His own eternal glory, implies the communicated excellency and happiness of His creatures." "In communicating His fullness for them, He does it for Himself because of their good, which He seeks their good, which he seeks is so much in union and communion with himself. God is their good, their excellence and happiness is nothing but the emanation and expression of God's glory. God in seeking their glory and happiness seeks Himself and in seeking himself as diffused and expressed, which he delights in as he delights in His own beauty and fullness, He seeks their glory and happiness." You know what I think of when I read something like that? I think I'm so thankful that people don't write like that anymore. What on earth is Jonathan Edwards talking about? Well, I sat down, I chewed on this, I thought about it for a week for a little bit, had a migraine for like three days, but I got through it. This is what I think he's saying. Think of it like this, imagine that there's two men desiring the same woman's hand in marriage pursuing her. Now, the first man is strong, he's handsome, he's intelligent, he's successful, wealthy, compassionate, brave. He is everything that a woman could ever desire in a man. More than that, he loves her with all of his heart. He cherishes her, he treasures her. He would do anything for her, even lay down his own life if she were ever in danger. That's bachelor number one. Bachelor number two is a criminal. He's a predator looking for someone to use an abuse. He's a violent, unscrupulous, selfish, deadbeat, ugly loser living in his mom's basement, trolling people on the internet all day. He's got food stuck in his beard. He's got Cheetos dust on his fingers just 24/7. Would it be wrong for the honorable man to defend his honor in this situation? Would it be wrong for him to insist that this woman that he loves value his virtues and even despise the vice of this other man to, in a sense, seek his own glory even to the point of demanding that she stay away from this dangerous predator. That would not be wrong. In seeking his own glory, the honorable man is actually seeking his beloveds good. Now, this is not a perfect illustration because we cannot imagine a perfect man. There are no perfect men except of course for Jesus Christ, and that's the point. We take the premise of this illustration, times it by an infinitely glorious and perfect God. Then, you begin to understand what Edwards means. God is love, and the most loving thing God can therefore do is pursue his glory because the glory of the creator is the good of the creation. In commanding us to worship God, he is commanding our joy. He is commanding our greatest good that to command us to worship him is like commanding a bird to fly free in the sky. To command us not to worshiping anything else is like commanding a fish to stay away from the desert. He he's doing what is best for us in seeking his own glory. If you have your Bibles open up to John 4, we're going to be looking at a story today that is really a case study in what we've just talked about that shows us how and why this is so true. How important it is that we worship and that we worship the right God in the right way. John 4 is the story of the woman at the well. In this story, Jesus gives us what is arguably the most important teaching on worship that we have in all of holy scripture. If you have your Bibles, you can follow along. The words are also going to be up here on the screen. This is John 4, beginning in verse one. "Now, when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although he himself did not baptize but only his disciples, he left Judea and departed again for Galilee, and he had to pass through Samaria. He came to a town of Samaria called Sychar near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, so Jesus wearied as he was from his journey was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour, a woman from Samaria came to draw water and Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink. For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food." The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me a woman of Samaria for Jews have no dealings with Samaritans." Jesus answered her. If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, "Give me a drink." You would've asked him and he would've given you living water." The women said to him, "Sir, you have nothing to draw water with. The well is deep, where are you going to get the living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drink from it himself as it sons in his livestock. Jesus said to her again, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him, he'll never be thirsty again." "The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water welling of to eternal life. The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirst or have to come here to draw water." Jesus said to her, "Go call your husband and come here." The woman answered him, "I have no husband." Jesus said to her, "You are right in saying I have no husband, for you have had five husbands. The one you now have is not your husband. What you have said it's true." The woman said to him, "Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our father's worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship." Jesus said to her, woman, "Believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father, you worship what you do not know." "We worship what we know for salvation is from the Jews, but the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the father and spirit and truth. For the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship and spirit and truth." The women said to him, "I know that the Messiah is coming. He is called the Christ. When he comes, he will tell us all things." Jesus said to her, "I who speak to you am He." This is the reading of God's word for us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? Father, help us to become to be the worshipers that you are seeking. Teach us to worship in spirit and in truth, God, give us a glimpse of your glory that stirs our hearts and affections with all and wonders so that we cannot help but to declare your praise. That we cannot help but to offer our lives as a living sacrifice and worship to you, to give you glory in all that we say and do. Lord, speak to us now we pray through your holy word. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, it's been a while since we've done a traditional three-point sermon and we're going to do one of those this morning. The three points of our sermon today are this, that point number one that the father is seeking worshipers, 0.2, who will worship in spirit in the truth, and 0.3 is both in Word and in deed. Jesus tells us that the father is seeking worshipers, John 4:23, he says, "The hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the father in spirit and truth for the Father is seeking such people to worship him." We already talked about how this is not wrong or selfish for God to do, to seek worshipers to pursue his own glory. This story is really a case study and why that's true, to help us to see all of the ramifications that come along with this. Jesus tells the woman, he says, "You worship what you do not know." As you read the context, it becomes clear that Jesus, he is not just talking about this theological feud that was going on between the Jews and Samaritans. That was certainly part of what Jesus was talking about, but he's pressing into something far deeper, far more personal for this woman at the well. The first thing he says is, "Hey, go call your husband." Well, he knows full well that she has no husband. As she says, "I've had five, the person I'm now with is not my husband." This is where Jesus goes because he knows that this is the temple that they're arguing about. This is the temple where she had been worshiping. This is the idol that has a hold of her heart that for so many years this woman has been searching for a Messiah among mortals. Bouncing from man to man to man, hoping to find satisfaction for her soul, through intimacy, through sex, and it's destroying her life. This is the irony of idolatry that our idols, they promise to satisfy the deepest longings of our heart. Then, the more we draw from those wells, the more we drink of that water, the thirstier we become. Instead of satisfaction, she finds a life of sin and shame. She finds a life of heartache, humiliation, a life of regret. Jesus, he preemptively addressed this in verse 13, this is what he is talking about when he says, "Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again." He's not talking about water, he's talking about her. He's talking about her life. He's talking about the futility of her idolatry, trying to find her hope or peace or satisfaction in something lesser than God. One of the reasons that we may be cringed at the idea of God's seeking worshipers, of being devoted to his glory is because we simply, we fail to understand how good God is on the one hand, but then we also fail to really fully understand how futile and how deadly idolatry and sin are on the other. This woman's idols, they were destroying her life. The prophet Jeremiah in Jeremiah 2:12, it says, "Be appalled, O heavens at this. Be shocked and utterly desolate declares the Lord. For my people have committed two evils, they have forsaken me. The fountain of living waters and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water." There's so much more going on in this story than just conversation about a well and it's water. Jesus is talking about the idols in her heart. This is why when we look at scripture and we look at the topic of idolatry, we also see accompanied with that the topic of God's wrath, that God has wrath. His wrath burns against our idolatry. He hates it with a passion because he loves us with a passion because he sees what it does to us, that our idols come and they offer us the world, but then they kill, they steal, they destroy. They take away everything. Our dignity, the glory that we were created for as image bearers of God. One of the most just brutally clear teachings of this in all of scripture comes from Romans chapter one, Romans 1:18, Paul writes this. He says, "The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness, suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them." For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and His divine nature have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made, so they're without excuse." For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened, claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals, and creeping things. "Therefore, God gave them up and the lusts of their hearts to impurity and to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served creature, the creature rather than the creator who was blessed forever. You see what Paul's getting at? You see what's going on here. It's this idea that in giving our glory to anything other than God, we're not robbing God of His glory. God is infinitely perfect in His glory. We cannot add to or subtract from God's glory, from His splendor, but when we give our glory to anything lesser than God, we are robbing ourselves. We are in a sense giving away our dignity, giving away our humanity. We exchange wells of living water for broken, empty cisterns. We exchange living in the truth for living a life of lies. We exchange wisdom for folly, honor for shame, dignity for a debased life. We exchange the glory of the creator for created things. The big idea is that in this exchange, we ourselves are being changed. That we are becoming like whatever it is that we behold in worship. Now, as image bearers of God, we were created to behold God in worship and to grow in more glory of his likeness. The 2 Corinthians 3:17 Paul talks about this says that, "The Lord is the spirit and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. We all with unveiled faces beholding the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. That this is what happens when we worship the right God in the right way, we're growing increasing degrees of glory. When we fail to do that, the opposite is true as well. We become less like him and more like creation. We begin to behave like animals, like the creeping things that we worship. We begin to become controlled by our fleshly impulses. We become increasingly inhumane. We become increasingly consumed by dishonorable passions. This is exactly what Paul says as he continues in verse 26. He says, "For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchange natural relations for those that are contrary to nature. The men likewise, gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another." "Men committing shameless acts with men in receiving in themselves to do penalty for their error. Since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with alt manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They're full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness, their gossips, slanders, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless." "Though they know that God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them, but they give approval to those who practice them." It's chilling how much it feels like this is just becoming more and more the state of our world every day. We shouldn't be surprised because this is the natural end of idolatry. This is the horrifying end of misdirected worship. By rejecting the God of heaven, we are inviting hell on earth. This is the reason that a good and loving God is jealous for us, and even angry when we do not give him the glory that He deserves because he knows idolatry always leads to death, it always invites hell. Right now, this hell on earth is temporary and it is escapable by the power of the gospel, by the blood of Jesus Christ there can be redemption and forgiveness of sins. What we see is that a day is coming when those who refuse to repent and refuse to worship God as they are, will find themselves not just experiencing a hell on earth but existing in a hell for all of eternity. This should break our hearts, the scripture describes hell as a place of unbearable conscience, eternal selfishness, and suffering. Where people are forever cut off from the presence of God's glory. This is 1 Thessalonians 2:9, it says, "They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction away from away from the presence of the Lord and the glory of his might when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, to be marveled, that among all who have believed Jesus is coming." This is true, and we may bristle at this. We may not want to talk about it, but it's true. We know that it's true because we see the warning signs of it all around us in our world right now. This is why Jesus runs into this woman at the well. He doesn't talk about the weather. He's not there to shoot the breeze just to carry on a casual conversation. He goes straight to the most off limit, sensitive, dark part of her life and says, "I want to talk about that." Why would he do that? He did that because he loved her because this was the idol that was destroying her life. The only way for her to live was for it to die. He goes there and that this couldn't have been fun, it couldn't have been easy to do, but he could see the eternal destruction of her idolatry was already having effect in her present life and he wanted to pull her from those flames before it was too late. He goes there, love compels him to talk about this. He couldn't stand to see her any longer returning day after day to the well of her sin, of her shame, of her sin, of her idolatry, hopelessly drawing water that was never going to quench. The application for us right now, this story it's not just about her, it's about us. What is that well that broken cistern in your life, are you holding on to any idols? Maybe you go to them occasionally, maybe you go to them habitually. Are you looking to created things to find your comfort, your hope, your peace, your joy and happiness and life? Jesus tells us in verse 13 says, listen, "Everyone who drinks of this water, they're going to be thirsty again. It's never going to satisfy you, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." Verse 10, he says, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that saying to you, "Give me a drink, you'd have asked him and he would've given you this living water." The woman responds on verse 15, he says, "Sir, give it to me. Give me this water so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water. It's a beautiful glorious thing to know that the father is seeking worshipers. He's seeking people who will draw water from the well of Christ and extinguish the flames of their idols and find their satisfaction, everything that their hearts have longed for are satisfied in him. Jesus first tells us that the father is seeking worshipers. He also tells us that the kind of worshipers that the father is seeking, and verse 23 says that the hour is coming and it is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. For the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth. This is point number two today that we worship in spirit and truth. Romans 1, John 4, Exodus 20, they all tell us how important it is that we worship the right God. They also tell us how important it's that we worship him in the right way. The right way, and that Jesus tells us is to worship him in spirit and truth. What does that mean to worship God in spirit and truth? I think the truth part comes a little bit easier. That part's not too difficult to understand that to worship in truth means that we must worship God for who He truly is. We do not worship God as we imagine Him to be. We do not worship Him for who we hope or we desire Him to be. We worship Him for who He has revealed himself to be, that He has revealed himself through His word. He's told us what He's like and how He ought to be worshiped through the living word that's Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and through the written word, holy scripture, that's how we know God. Today, Hebrews 1 says, "Long ago and many times, and in many ways God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. In these last days, he has spoken to us by His son whom He appointed the heir of all things through whom He also created the world. He, Jesus, the Son, is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature. He upholds the universe by the word of his power. John began his gospel, John chapter 1, he says, "In the beginning was the word and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him was not anything made that has been made and Him was life and that life was the light of men. Then in verse 14, and he says, "This word became flesh and he dwells among us. We have seen His glory, the glory as the only son from the Father who is full of grace and truth." This is what it means to worship in truth that our understanding of God and how we worship him, it's not something we find by looking inwardly into ourselves. It is something that we can only find and discover by looking to the truth that God has revealed to us through his word, through the living word, Jesus Christ and through his written word of holy scripture. We must worship in truth, but we also must worship in spirit. What does it mean to worship in spirit? Well, if you're familiar with John's gospel, when John talks about the spirit, he's almost always talking about the Holy Spirit and the gift or the indwelling Holy Spirit that is going to come upon Jesus of followers, that to worship in spirit, it does not require us to go to a holy temple, it requires us to have the Holy Spirit. Jesus talked about this in chapter three with Nicodemus, how you need to be born again by the Spirit. This is why Jesus tells the Samaritan woman, "Listen, the time is coming in. It's here right now. It's not going to matter whether you worship God here or there at this mountain or that temple, what's going to matter is that you have the Holy Spirit of God within you." Last week, when we talked about prayer, we talked about how prayer is this Trinitarian experience of Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. The same is true of worship, that we worship in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the truth of Jesus Christ and spirit and in truth. That is part of it that we must worship with the Spirit in the Spirit as those who have been born again by the Holy Spirit. Now, in addition to this, I think Jesus just to make it practical, when we talk about worshiping in his spirit and truth, the idea here is that it goes beyond just our understanding and our mind, and it produces a proper posture in our hearts. It produces a right attitude and a right affection for God in our hearts when we have the right understanding and when we have the right spirit within us, that these two things together then result in a proper response to God in praise. Throughout scripture, the way people respond to God, we express this. It's through love, it's through our obedience, it's through sacrifice, and it is through praise. It's through the words that we say, and we're going to talk a little bit here in a little bit about how therefore worship really in includes every aspect of our life. One of the most natural ways for us to express this to God all at once is through singing to him with Psalm, with music. Psalm 108:1 says, "I will sing and make melody to God with my lips? No, he says, "With all of my being. Awake, O, harp and lyre. I will wake the dawn, I will give thanks to you, oh Lord, among the peoples, and I'll sing your praises to you among the nations for your stud fast love is great above the heavens. Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds that when we sing, we sing with our whole being. Have you ever stopped to think about why we sing in church? It is just normal, but when you think about it's strange. People usually don't just sing. I said in the newsletter, people pretty much they sing when they're drunk or they sing when they're in love. That's the reason we sing. Hopefully, you're not drunk, but we sing because we love. We sing because we can't contain the feeling, the affection that we have for God our Father as we think about who he is and as we think about what he has done for us. There is a unique and at times transcendent wholeness that is produced when words and music come together. When we sing, we have a message of truth that we are engaging with our minds. The words that we sing matter, but then how we sing them matters as well. This message in our minds that stirs up evokes emotions in our heart. Then, we engage our whole body, we sing out loud, we move, we clap our hands, we raise our arms. Whatever we do that we sing in sync, we sing in rhythm, we sing with dynamics and harmony. The music moves because it is meant to move us. It is meant to be this whole body multisensory experience. The point that I'm trying to make is that our praise should not be rote. It should not be half-hearted, apathetic, indifferent. It should not seem boring or stale. Our praise should be the passionate response of hearts that have been set on fire by the glory of God. It's the response of hearts that have properly understood just how beautiful and glorious and worthy of praise God really is. Psalm 33 says, "Shout for joy in the Lord. O, you righteous. Praise benefits the upright. Give thanks to the Lord with the lyre. Make melody to him with the harp of 10 strings. Sing to him a new song, play skillfully on the strings with loud shouts. For the word of the Lord is upright, and all of his work is done in faithfulness. He loves righteousness and justice, and the earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord." Psalm 47:1 says, "Clap your hands, all people. Shout to God with loud songs of joy. For the Lord, the Most High is to be feared, a great king over all the earth. Psalm 150 says, "Praise the Lord. Praise God in his sanctuary. Praise him in his mighty heavens. Praise him for his mighty deeds. Praise him according to his excellent greatness. Praise him with the trumpet sound, praise him with the lute and harp. Praise him with tambourine and dance and praise him with strings and pipe. Praise him with sounding cymbals. Praise him with the loud crashing cymbals." That's Caleb's new life verse as he's learning to play the drums. Let everything that has breath, praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Then, Ephesians 5:14 says, "Therefore awake, wake up, O, sleeper and arise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. Look carefully then how you live, not as unwise, but as wise, making the most best use of the time because the days are evil."Not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is, and do not get drunk with wine for that is debauchery, but be filled with the spirit addressing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart. Giving thanks always and for everything to God, the Father, and the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." If a father is seeking worshipers, who will worship him in spirit and in truth, not sluggishly, not with apathy, not half asleep, but fully wide awake to his glory, responding just with passionate, affectionate, transcendent expressions of thanksgiving and praise. We are to worship the Father in spirit and in truth. Then, point number three today is that we must also worship him both in word and deed. Worship is not anything less than what we give God as we sing his praise together, but it is obviously a whole lot more than that. Worship is a lifestyle of obedience and love to God. The Father is seeking worshipers who will worship in spirit and in truth, and therefore worship him both in word and deed. We have a great example of this in our story today. We have a great example in both in Jesus Christ and in the woman at the well as she responds to him. I didn't read this part earlier, but we're going to read a little bit more of the story right now because after Jesus reveals himself to her as the Messiah, the next thing we're told is we're told what's happened next. In verse 27. It says, "Then, his disciples came back and they marveled that he was talking with a woman and no one said, what do you seek or why are you talking with her? The woman left your water jar and went away into the town and said to the people, "Come and see a man who told me everything that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?" Now, I want to just stop and back up there for a moment because this didn't even hit me until I was looking over my notes and reading meditating of the text this morning. It tells us that the disciples show up and the woman takes off and she leaves and she leaves her what? She leaves her water jar. She leaves that thing that symbolizes the idol that had a hole on her life for so long. The thing that they were talking about that, but they weren't really talking about. She leaves it there and she runs into that town because she has to tell everyone, "Come and see the man who told me everything I ever did. Can this be to Christ?" They went out of the town and they were coming to him. Now, meanwhile, the disciples were urging him saying, "Rabbi, eat." He said to them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about." The disciples said to one another, "Has anyone brought him something to eat?" Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say there are yet four months, and then comes the harvest. Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life so that the sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, one sows another reaps I sent you to reap for that for which you did not labor others have labored and you have entered into their labor. He's referring to all the people of the town that are now coming out to see him, to hear and to receive the gospel. It says that as they did verse 39, many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony. She told them, "He told me all that I ever did." When the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them. He stayed there for two days and many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, "It's no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves." We know that this indeed is the savior of the world. That true worship, as we see here, it cannot be confined to a time, a place, a song, a service. True worship is a lifestyle of obedience, of praise, of testifying to the grace of Jesus Christ in our life. This is what Jesus did, this is what the woman does. Romans 12:1 says, "I appeal to you, therefore brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as living sacrifices holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship." That true worship. It is the entirety of our lives given as a living sacrifice to the glory of God. Verse 34, Jesus says, this is why he says, "My food, I don't need the bread that you went into town to give me because my food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish His work." That Jesus' purpose in life was to glorify the Father, not just in the songs that he sang as they traveled around or they attended a synagogue or temple together, that was certainly a part of it. Jesus' purpose was to glorify the Father in all that He said, all that He did, because for him, this was more satisfying to Jesus than even bread for an empty stomach. That's true of Jesus, and it also proved true of the woman at the well. She now, as Jesus says, "I have bread that you don't even know about. She has water that they don't even know about. She's goes to go tell everyone about it because her drink is now to do the will of the one who has sent her. She runs into the town and she begins to tell everybody that she had come to the well that day, thirsty, and she had left satisfied. She had come there in shame and she had left in honor. She had come there with all of her regrets about the past, and she left with a vision and a purpose for her future. She arrived in disgrace and she left in God's grace. She arrived at her broken cistern, but she leaves her water jar there. She runs into the village to tell everyone that she had found the living water that her soul had been looking for, that this woman who had lived a life of shame about everything that she ever did, was now willing to go and face those people and say, "Come and see the man who told me everything I ever did. That her reputation, her story had not become her testimony." You have to think about this, the reason that she was out there at, well, in the middle of the day, in the heat of the day, the reason she bumped into Jesus in the first place, well, it's because she wasn't there when she was supposed to be there. She wasn't there when all the other women of the village would've been there drawing their water in the cool of the day. The reason she wasn't there, because she was intentionally didn't want to be there, she was avoiding them. She was ashamed to show her face among the other women of the village because she had a reputation. She didn't want to go and see the sideways glances and hear the whispering gossip or the snide passive-aggressive remarks. She had a shameful reputation. But Jesus had redeemed this, he turned it into her testimony, and now she boldly, she excitedly goes, and she runs into the village. She finds every man, woman, child who will listen to her and she begins to tell them about Jesus, about the living water that she had found, and they all go out to meet him together. This had to have been hard, to go and to face the people that had really probably mistreated and rejected her, treated her as a bit of an outside. She had to forgive them, she had to love them, and she had to go, and she was willing to go. It was the only proper response to the mercy that she had just found in Jesus Christ to go and to face her fears, to face those people and to just boldly tell them the good news about what she had discovered. For the first time in her life, she felt secure. She felt peace, she felt joy. She felt loved that for the first time in her life there in the presence of Jesus, everything began to make sense. She was safe with her savior. She was no longer the woman of five husbands who was now living with her deadbeat boyfriend. That was not her identity anymore. She had been saved by the Christ, the Messiah, she was now a daughter of the king. She was now a child of God, beloved, cherished, redeemed, and her restless heart had finally found its home there in the presence of Jesus Christ, and she was never the same. Saint Augustine wrote in his confessions, "Great art, Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised, great is thy power and of Thy wisdom, there is no end. Thou movest us to delight in praising Thee. For Thou has formed us for Thyself and our hearts are restless until they rest in thee. Oh, how shall I find rest in Thee. Who will send Thee into my heart to inebriate it so that I may forget my woes and embrace Thee as my only good? What art Thou to me have compassion on me that I may speak? What am I to Thee that thou demandest my love, and unless I give it Thee art angry and even threatenest me with great sorrows. Is it then a light sorrow not to love Thee? Alas! Alas! Tell me of Thy compassion, O Lord, my God, what are Thou art to me? Say unto my soul, "I am thy salvation." Speak that I may hear. Behold Lord, the ears of my heart are before the open them Thou them and say, under my soul, "I am thy salvation." When I hear, may I run and lay hold of Thee hide not Thy face for me. Let me die, lest I die if only I may see Thy face." This is a picture of what it looks like to be a living sacrifice. Let me die lest I die. Let me die to myself, let me die to my pride. Let me die to living life for my own glory so that I can find myself fully satisfied in living my life for the glory of God. It's the only thing that's going to satisfy my soul. It's a sacrifice, it's a living sacrifice because we have to give up. We have to give ourselves away, but it's a living sacrifice because we know that as we do in Christ, the well that we are drawing from is a well of living water that will never run dry. We're going to have an opportunity to respond and praise and worship here in a moment. Today, we're doing something special as a church, we are celebrating communion together. Today, we're coming to the Lord's table and communion this is a sacred symbol really, of everything that we have been talking about today, that the true food is the body of Christ. The true drink is the living water that he offers us. In John 6, a few chapters later in verse 53, Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life." Now, obviously, he's not talking about literal flesh and blood here. We know what he's talking about. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks, my blood has eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food and my body is true drink." "Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father. Whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread of the father's ate and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever." The way that we celebrate communion, hopefully, you got one of these as you came in. If not, just raise your hand right now. The ushers would happy to bring you one wherever you're seated. There's a bread in here in the cup here. The bread represents the body of Christ that was broken for us. The cup represents his blood that was poured out to make a new covenant in His blood for the forgiveness of our sins. We will all take this together here in a moment. I'll pray for us and then we will take communion together. If you are here today and you're a Christian, we would welcome you to celebrate communion with us. If you're here today and you're not a Christian, we would ask you to refrain. There's nothing magical about this, it's not going to do anything for you apart from repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. If you're here today and you're a Christian, but you've been living in unrepentant sin while scripture also warns us to not partake of communion in an unworthy manner, that you either refrain or you spend this time right now to confess and to repent of your sin before the Lord and to remember the sacrifice that Jesus made to make that possible. If you do that or if you've committed your life to Christ for the first time today, you've repented and you put your faith in Him, we'd welcome you to join us as we celebrate communion together. Let's pray and then we will take communion together. Father, we come and we confess our sin. We confess our idolatry. We confess that our hearts are not as on fire for you as they should be, but too often that fire is quenched by desires, passions, competing idols for our hearts, so we repent. Help us to see your beauty, your goodness, your glory, and that by the power of the living water of Jesus Christ, that you would just extinguish the flames of these idols that are constantly vying for our attention to live our lives purely devoted to being living sacrifices given for you, knowing that Jesus Christ came to be a dying sacrifice for us, that he truly did go to the death, that his body was given up, his blood was poured out. The full wrath of God for arson fell upon him so that we could be forgiven, we could be reconciled, we could be loved, adopted into your family, and to be called the children of God. We thank you, Jesus for this tremendous sacrifice that you have made. If it's not real to us, Lord, make it real to us right now, that you truly did come in a body of flesh, that you truly did suffer and die. More than that, you experienced the moment as the Father forsook you pouring his wrath out upon you to pay the eternal debt that we could have never paid on our own. Jesus, we thank you, we praise you for that. Not only for that, but for the good news that you did not stay there, but that you rose in victory and triumph over Satan's sin and death, and that you've given us this time now to take this bread in. Take this cup as a way of proclaiming your death until you come again and we look forward to that day when you do. To judge the world in righteousness and to make all things new, to wipe away every tear so we can be there in your presence and your joy forever. Jesus, we thank you. We praise you, we love you. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen. Lord Jesus, on the night that he was betrayed, he took bread after giving thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples. He said, "This is my body given for you. Take, eat, and do this and remembrance of me. He then took the cup said, "This is the cup of the new covenant in my blood. Take drink, do this in remembrance of me." Jesus, we just thank you again for your sacrifice. Father, we thank you for sending your son, the Holy Spirit. We thank you for entering our lives to be that wellspring of living water, cleansing us, sanctifying us, and convicting us, and helping us to grow an ever-increasing glory from one degree to another, more and more like our Savior, Jesus Christ. God, I pray that the reality of who you are and all that you have done, the gravity of that would fall on us now in our minds, but that understanding of the truth would stir our hearts and affections to truly praise you and sing of your glory as we ought, as you deserve to be praised. We love you. We praise you together right now in Jesus' name. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Prayer and Fasting

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 26, 2023 47:56


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. We are continuing oursermon series today called Committed. We've been talking about the essentialhabits of an abundant life and what we've been saying over and over throughoutthis series is that we are taking a look at some of the essential,nonnegotiable and just super practical commitments that every Christian needsto make in order to grow in their faith and persevere through life and toexperience and to enjoy the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give. And if you were here last week, our teens director, Tyler, did an awesome job talking about our commitment to Scripture and I hope that that sermon just left you with a greater appreciation, a greater trust, a greater hunger and appetite for God's word. It's amazing that we worship a god who speaks, a god who has chosen to reveal Himself to us as His creation and we should never take that for granted, right? If God has something to say, we want to hear it. We want to listen. And it is awesome to think that we have access to the word of God recorded for us in Scripture. We worship a god who speaks. We also worship a god who listens. And this is what we are going to be talking about today as we look at the topics, the commitments of fasting and prayer. Like so many of the things that we've talked about in this series, this is not something we do, it is something we commit to, that fasting and prayer, they're not going to happen by accident, they're not going to happen on their own, that these are things that like the early church we need to devote ourselves to doing. And for some of us, maybe that feels like hard work. I don't know about you, but sometimes prayer could begin to feel like a grind. It could feel like something that you have to do or something that you're supposed to do when really we should view prayer as something that we get to do. And as we learn to do these things properly, even if at times they might feel like a grind, they might feel like a drudgery, they should become our delight, that as we practice them persistently, we find in them a great reward. And I use that word because that's the word that we're going to see Jesus used over and over in our text today when He talks about fasting in prayer. He keeps using this word reward. And so is that a word that you use? Is that a word that you think about when you think about fasting, when you think about prayer? Before we begin this morning, I want you to do something for me right now. I just want you to mentally do a quick evaluation of your prayer life. Rate yourself, scale of one to 10, 10 is everything's great, you've got an abundant, flourishing, vibrant, rewarding prayer life. One is it's dry, it's a grind, barely existence. Your prayer life is on a life support. Does prayer feel like a requirement, like a drudgery, like something that you have to do or does it feel like a reward? Does it feel like a delight, something that you get to do? Wherever you just rated yourself, none of us are a 10, we've all have room to grow and so my hope today is that we can all go up in our rating together. And so if you just said, "Well, I feel like I'm a two or a three," well, what would it take to get from a three to like a seven or to get from a five to a nine? What would it take for us to all grow to have a prayer life that's more like that of Christ Jesus? And lucky for us, this is something that Jesus' disciples wondered as well and they at times would ask Jesus, "Hey, Jesus, can you teach us how to pray?" And He did. On multiple occasions, Jesus taught His disciples how to pray and one of those is the text that we're going to be looking at this morning. It's Matthew chapter six, verse five through 21. This is a part of the sermon on the Mount. And Jesus spends a considerable amount of time teaching His disciples about this topic of fasting and prayer. So we're going to walk through this text together. It's a bit of a long text and we're going to just go through it section by section. And as we do, I want us to look at five commitments that are going to help us to avoid some of the pitfalls of prayer and fasting that we could potentially fall into, but also to just have an increasingly vibrant, abundant, powerful and rewarding prayer life that God wants us to have. So if you have your Bibles, we are in Matthew chapter six, beginning in verse five. The words are also going to be up here on the screen. This is what Jesus said, "And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray and stand in the synagogues and on the street corners that they may be seen by others. And truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who's in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. Pray then like this, 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.' For if you forgive others their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites. They just figure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where mouth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." This is the reading of God's holy word for us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? God, we pray that we would learn to treasure You as we ought. And God, we pray that You would forgive us for not praying as we ought. Lord, You warned Your disciples in the garden to watch and to pray that they might not enter into temptation for the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is so weak. And God, we confess our weakness to You and we praise You that Your strength, Your power is made perfect in our weakness, that Your grace is greater than our failures. And so Lord, we ask today that You would to teach us to pray as we ought, teach us to live continually in Your presence, experiencing the blessing of knowing that You are always with us and You always hear us, that we can come and we can talk to You at any time. Teach us what it means to be anxious about nothing but to pray about everything because we know that You are with us, You see us, You hear us, You love us and You are able to provide for our every need. Lord, You are the God who hears and I pray that we would marvel at that reality today and we give You thanks and glory for it now, in Jesus' name, amen. All right, well, before teaching His disciples how to pray, Jesus first we see, He teaches them how not to pray and He gives them two examples. He says, "On the one hand, don't go and don't pray like the hypocrites. Don't pray like the Pharisees, the religious people." And on the other hand, He says, "Don't pray like the Gentiles, like the lawless pagans either." And so let's start with the religious people that with the Pharisees in verse five, Jesus says, "When you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray and stand in the synagogues and not at the street corners that they may be seen by others. And truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret and your Father who sees in secret will reward you." Now, first of all, we need to understand Jesus isn't condemning public prayer. He's not saying that there's never an appropriate time for Christians to pray in public with one another. Corporately, we see it in the New Testament that that is something that the early church was devoted to doing, that it is a good thing for God's people to come and to pray together publicly. But what Jesus is telling us and what we all need to be cautious of is this, that if we find in ourselves that we can go to church and pray with other Christians or we can go to community group and we've got a lot of things to say to God and we can pray with lofty words and eloquence and everything sounds very polished, but then we go home. And when we're alone with God in secret, we've got nothing to talk about, well, He says that's a problem. That's a symptom of a pretty serious illness in the diagnosis that he gives is hypocrisy. I think of it like this. I don't know if you've ever been over at a friend's house like hanging out and then somebody you don't know, one of their friends comes in and joins you. Maybe it's a coworker or neighbor or something like that. And at first, everything's great. You're having a good time, hanging out. The conversation is going well and everybody seems friendly and then your friend gets up and leaves the room and now you're trapped in this awkward deafening silence. And a moment ago, we thought, "I thought we were all friends, but now that they're gone, I realize that was an illusion. You are not my friend. I don't even know you. You're a stranger and we've got nothing to say to each other." Well, don't be like that with God. If you are like that with God, that is a cause for concern. If you find it easy to talk to God when other people, other Christians are around, but you can't talk to Him in private, oh, maybe you've fallen into the same pit as the Pharisees and maybe you've figured out how to look really religious and sound really spiritual when other people are around, but there's no real relationship there with God. He says, "Don't fall into that pit. If the pathway to prayer is this narrow road, you've got this dangerous ditch on the one side that the Pharisees fell into," but he says, "But there's also this other ditch on the other side that the Gentiles fall into. So he says, "Don't be like the pagans either," and this is what He talks about in verse seven. He says, when you pray, "Don't just heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words." He says, "Don't be like them as your Father knows what you need even before you ask." See, unlike the Jews who were monotheistic, they believed in one God rightly, the Gentiles believed in a pantheon of gods and their relationship to these gods was not particularly healthy. The gods were seemingly mostly motivated by their own selfish self-interest. And so the people envisioned their gods as these kind of powerful but moody beings and they needed to be appeased. They needed to be persuaded, even maybe bribed in order to care about the plights of mortal people. And their hope was that if they used the right words, if they prayed to the right god with the right words, in the right place, at the right temple with the right idols and the right sacrifices, well, maybe they could get somebody's attention out there. And so they would babble and they would heap up all of these words, as Jesus said, because they were just trying to cover all of their bases like, "If I just do this enough, maybe something will happen. Just throw a plethora of prayers out into the cosmos and hope that maybe somebody out there is listening." And Jesus says, "Don't be like that. Don't be like the Gentiles. The Gentiles weren't just a little-stitious, they're more than a little-stitious. They were superstitious. He says, "Don't be superstitious about prayer. It's not some magic incantation that you need to figure out. Prayer is not a way to tap into some higher power or manipulate some spiritual system. Prayer is just simply a conversation with God. And God is not a system. He is not a power. He is a person." And so I said we'd look at five commitments of a rewarding prayer life. And the first one is that, before anything else, we need to commit to this. We need to pray to God with God as a person. And I use the word with. We often talk about praying to God. Not necessarily anything wrong with that, but I'm using the word with here intentionally for two different reasons. First of all is because the Gentiles prayed to their gods, but they can never really be sure if the gods were listening to them. They could never be sure if anybody out there was hearing that they send their prayers off like an email and who knows? Maybe it just wound up in someone's spam folder. Maybe it just got deleted right away. They could never be sure. But we don't pray like that, that when we pray to God, we pray to a god that we know we have confidence, we have assurance that He is with us, that God is all knowing, all seeing. He is omniscient, omnipresent and all powerful. He always hears all the prayers of His people. And eight times in this passage, Jesus refers to God in a very specific way that shows the intimate relationship that we are to have with Him. He refers to Him as our Father. I mentioned earlier that this passage, it comes from the Sermon of the Mount, and later on in the same sermon, Jesus comes back to this topic of prayer in Matthew chapter seven and He's talking about the relationship of us praying to God as a father. And in verse seven, he says this. He says, "Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks, receives and he who seeks finds and to Him who knocks the door will be opened." And he says, "Or which one of you, if his son asks for bread, we give him a stone, or if he asks for a fish, would give him a serpent? If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, well, then how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him?" I don't know about your dad's situation. Some of you had very good dads, maybe some of you didn't. The point that Jesus is making here though is that even the very best of earthly fathers seems evil when compared to the goodness, the kindness, the grace of our God, our Heavenly Father." And God wants us to know Him as a good Father, as a father who is so good, so loving, so attentive that He not only sees us, He knows what we need even before we ask Him," Jesus says. And Jesus calls God our Father. We need to relate to God as our Father. He also calls Him our Heavenly Father, that we can approach God with the affection and the intimacy of a father, but we must also approach Him with the reverence and the honor and the respect due to a Heavenly Father that our God as a father is perfect in His goodness. He's also perfect in His holiness. He teaches us to pray, "Our Father who arts in heaven, hallowed be Thy name." And so what does it mean to say that God is holy? It means that He is morally perfect in every way. He is completely pure without compromise, without contradiction. He is utterly distinct and set apart with no rival, with no equal for His glory, for His righteousness. And actually when you look at Scripture, what you see is that God is so holy, he is so righteous that anything unrighteous is unable to even stand before His presence, that even the angels of heaven, and when Isaiah has his vision, that they cover their faces before the holiness of God, that God is so righteous that anything containing even an ounce of sin, even the smallest imperfection, it would be destroyed before His holy presence as quickly as a shadow under the direct exposure of the sun. Hebrews 12:28 says, "Therefore, let us offer to God acceptable worship with reverence in awe, for our God is a consuming fire." Well, this is true. How can we, as sinful people, hope to stand before a Holy God in prayer? Well, I mentioned earlier, there's two reasons that we need to not just pray to God but with God. And the first is simply that God is with us as a father, but the second is that we cannot pray to God without God helping us to pray to God, that we cannot come before the Father without the power of the Holy Spirit, without the righteousness of His Son, Jesus Christ. This is what I mean, when we pray to the Father, we do so in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the name of Jesus Christ and we're able to, therefore, come boldly before the throne of God and stand before His righteousness, not because we're righteous. If we did that, we would die, but we are able to stand before His presence because, and only because, we have been covered by the righteous blood of His Son, Jesus Christ, that by grace through faith, the righteousness of Christ has been accredited to us. It covers us and we are able to stand before the Holy Father now and not just live, but to actually be loved, actually be welcomed into ... He looks at us and He sees us in the perfection of Jesus and welcomes us into His presence. And this is what it means to pray to God. It's really profound when you think about it. It is a Trinitarian experience, Father, Son and the Holy Spirit allowing us to come and experience just the awesome transcendent reality that our prayers can be heard by a Holy God. And that as they are and as we do, we realize that this Holy God is also our loving Father. And so commit to that, commit to having that mindset as you approach God, that you are speaking with God for the person that He is, both loving and holy, perfect in His holiness. Secondly, commit to pray with a plan. Jesus says in verse nine, He says, "Pray them like this." He's like, "I'm going to teach you. This is how you should pray. 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven and give us this day our daily bread, forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not unto temptation, but deliver us from evil.'" I think one of the reasons that Christians maybe don't pray as often as they should is because they lack that vision of God and who He is and the person of God that they are communicating with. I think if we had that mindset and we realize what an awesome privilege that is, we would pray more. But I think another reason that a lot of Christians maybe struggle with prayer is that they don't have a practical plan. And so really quick, I just want to look at four super practical things that if you're not doing them already, I would say start doing them and you'll find I think that these are going to help you with your prayer life because Jesus doesn't just say, "If you pray." There is a sense in which we are continually living in the presence of God, praying without ceasing. As we go about our day, we should have this mindset that God is with us. We are talking to Him throughout our day, that we have access to Him at any time, but then we should also plan specific times where we are going to sit down and focus and spend time with God in prayer. And that's not going to happen on its own. You need to have a plan. So first of all, you need to determine a time and a place. If you're a busy person, I don't know if there's busy people that live here in Boston, but if there are, you might need to put this on your calendar. You might need to schedule it. You need to plan ahead and say, "At this time of day, I'm going to stop what I'm doing and I am going to pray and I'm going to have a time, I'm also going to have a place." Where are you going to do it? When are you going? For me, personally, I literally go into my bedroom, I go into to our closet and I close the door. And especially if you got kids, sometimes that's the only way you're going to get any kind of privacy. And I close the door and I pray. And I pray out loud. I don't know why. I started doing this at some point and it helps me to stay focused. It helps my mind not to wander and I'm having a conversation with God, so why wouldn't I pray out loud? Hebrews 5:7 says, "In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplication with loud cries and tears and to Him who was able to save Him from death and He was heard because of His reverence." I don't think that there's anything wrong with praying silently to God, but if you haven't tried praying out loud, I would say it's helpful for me, maybe it will be helpful for you, but the main point is determine a time and a place. Be intentional about it and make it happen. Secondly, use a template. It's not cheating to go into your prayer time with a plan of the kind of things that you're going to pray about. And I know there's a lot of different templates out there and maybe you've used a variety of them throughout your life. One that's really popular that I've heard about is the ACTS model, like the Book of Acts, and they turned it into an acronym, adoration Confession, Thanksgiving and Supplication. And so that's great. That's a good model. You begin adoration. You just spend some time praising God for His attributes like offering Him worship for who He is. A confession, you lead into a time of repentance where you're asking God for forgiveness and confessing your sins to Him. And Thanksgiving, you thank God for His mercy, for His grace, for all of His provision in your life. And then supplication, you bring your requests to God. You lay your heart before Him and you bring Him all your worries, all your concerns, all of your anxieties. Philippians 4:5-7 says, "Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand, so therefore, do not be anxious about anything but in everything. By prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." So that's one model that people like to use and that's great. Me personally, I like to use the Lord's Prayer that we just read. The Lord's Prayer is a beautiful prayer on its own. You should memorize it. As Tyler said last week, you should internalize it. And I don't think that Jesus gave us this prayer to just memorize and then just like mindlessly recite over and over. I think He gave us this prayer as a good template, as a good model of the kind of things that the Father loves and wants to hear from us about. And so that's what I do. I pray through the Lord's Prayer and then I go back through it line by line, theme by theme and get more specific in my prayer time with God. Just personally, I find that really helpful. And then along with that, number three, is keeping a list. And so you've got your template. You keep a list. For me, I just do this in the little notepad app on my phone. Got it with me wherever I go. I got a list of general things that I'm praying about all the time. I pray for my wife, for my marriage, for my kids. I pray for Mosaic. I pray for the pastors, the staff, the community groups, the members of the church. And then as specific things come up in my life and the church's life and the life of people in our community group or whatever, I just add those to that list. Got it with me wherever I go. You do these things, pretty soon you find out you've got plenty of things to pray about that you need to be praying about with God. And fourthly, and this is really important, as you do this, as you make it a priority, you've got your plan, your template, you've got your list of things you're praying about, I record and remember. Sometimes you got to write things down that you're praying about, so that your future self is going to be able to look back and see and remember God's faithfulness throughout that time in your life. And I could give countless examples of this from my life, from members of our community group, but I think this is a good thing to do. Psalm 77 says, "Then I said I will appeal to this. I'll appeal to the year of the right hand of the Most High. I will remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember Your wonders of old. I will ponder all of Your work and meditate on Your mighty deeds. Your way, O, God is holy. What god is great like our God? You are the God who works wonders. You have made known Your might among the peoples." As Christians, we believe this, we know this to be true, that our God is a god who always hears and who always answers all of the prayers of all His people. Nothing gets by Him, nothing gets unnoticed, nothing slips past Him. He always answers our prayers. Now, that doesn't mean that He's always going to say yes to our prayers. He doesn't always answer yes, but He is always going to answer best. He's always going to give us what is most and needed most glorifying to Him. And so when He does, don't just forget it and move on. How many times have you maybe prayed for something and then it happens and you're like, "Oh, probably a coincidence. No." No, don't just move on. Write that down, record it, remember it so that the next time you're praying about something, you can rely on it, so that you can look back because there's going to be some points in your future whereas the psalmist said you're going to need to remember the deeds of the Lord so that you can face the fears in your future with the blessed reminders of God's faithfulness in your past, so that you can then stand firm there in the present. Not because you're strong, but because you know that God is faithful, that He is with you, that He has upheld you and that His hand is upon you. First Peter 5:68 says, "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that the proper time, He may exalt you, casting all of your anxieties on Him because He cares for you." So commit to pray with a plan. Number three, we see in this passage is we need to commit to pray with purity. Jesus says in His prayer, "Forgive us our debts as we've also forgiven our debtors and not and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil," and then he stops and he gives some commentary on this. And in verse 14, he says, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive yours." And now we got to be clear, Jesus is not teaching a model of works-based righteousness here. He's not talking about forgiveness in the context of our justification. We cannot save ourselves by forgiving others. We cannot lose our salvation by failing to forgive others. Jesus, that's not what He's talking about here, but what Jesus is talking about here is He's talking about forgiveness in the context of prayer and in the context of our relationship with God, and therefore, also our relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ. And the warning here is that things are not going to be right and good between you and God the Father if things are not right and good between you and your brothers and sisters in Christ. If you are holding a grudge, if you're holding onto anger, resentment, bitterness, you're refusing to forgive somebody. So don't be surprised then if your prayers are hindered. I guess as a father, I picture it like this. Remember Jesus, He shared that parable, "Hey, if your kid comes and asks for something to eat, you're not going to give them a stone." No, of course not. Why would a good parent withhold something good that their child needed? But let's back up and add some context to that. If your kid came to you and said, "Hey, dad, can I have some dinner?" but on the way to the dinner table, they pushed their sister and suplexed their little brother off of the couch and then they're standing there before you. It's like, "Well, hold on a minute. We got to talk. Yeah, we can talk about food. We can talk about dinner. We got bigger things to talk about like why you just smashed your little brother's face into the coffee table." You get the point. Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mountain, just the chapter before this, in chapter five, verse 23, "If you're offering your gift at the altar and there remember your brother has something against you," he says, "leave your gift there and go. First be reconciled to your brother, then come and offer your gift." This is how important, even if you're in the middle of worship, you're preparing to offer your gift at the altar, you're in the middle of praise and you're in middle of praise is stopped, first go be reconciled, then come and offer your gift. In Psalm 66, the psalmist said, "I cried to Him with my mouth and high praise was on my tongue. If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. But truly God has listened and He has attended to the voice of my prayers." The Apostle Peter talks about this in his first letter, both in chapter three, verse seven and in chapter four, verse seven, Peter says this. First, he speaks to the husbands. He says, "Husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that," what? "So that your prayers may not be hindered." He says, "Husbands, if you want your prayers to not be hindered, well, then you would better be treating God's daughter with the honor, with the tenderness, with the consideration that she deserves." And then in the next chapter, he speaks more generally to all Christians and he says in chapter four, verse seven, "To the end of all things is at hand, therefore, be self-controlled and sober-minded again for the sake of your prayers." Now, earlier when I asked you to rate yourself, your prayer life, if you were finding, if you were saying, "Ah, that's not so good. I'm like a two. I'm maybe a three," you need to maybe stop and ask yourself, "Could this be the reason why? Have I been cherishing iniquity in my heart? Have I been harboring sin, resentment? Have I been holding a grudge? Is there someone that I have been refusing to forgive or is there someone that I need to go to and ask for forgiveness?" Because when you got stuff like this in your life, the last thing that you're going to want to do is go and talk to God in prayer because you know that God knows, and you know that God's not going to let it go. He's going to press you on it. He's going to tell you, "You need to go and you need to deal with this right away." And so you begin to avoid God or you begin to put up a front to mask things, but you know that he sees straight through all of that. So if you're struggling with prayer, be honest. Ask yourself. Are you just going through the motions? Are you avoiding God and could the reason be that there is sin in your life that you know need to deal with, that you've been avoiding? The only way that you're going to dig yourself out of that ditch is to just stop hiding, stop running from God, stop putting up a front, wearing a mask. You just got to go to the Father in faith. You got to go to the Father. You got to just trust. You got to trust that God is going to be more satisfying than whatever sin, whatever iniquity you may have been cherishing in your heart. You got to trust that His way is going to be better than your way, that when you go to Him and you turn and you humble yourself and repent, He's not going to push you away, that He is going to welcome you back with open arms. But we need to commit to pray with purity, without hypocrisy, so that our prayers may not be hindered. Number four, Jesus begins talking about fasting. So committed to pray with fasting. Verse 16 says, "And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. And truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your Father who is in secret and your Father who sees in secret will reward you." Prayer and fasting, oftentimes, we talk about hand in hand. Unlike prayer, fasting is not something we do continually, unceasingly for practical reasons. You will eventually die of starvation if you try to do that. Fasting is a more occasional practice, but just like prayer, Jesus doesn't say, "Hey, if you fast." He says, "When you fast," he expects, he assumes that His disciples are going to fast and the question is not then, "Should we fast." The question is "When we fast, how should we fast? What should be the posture? What should be the motivation of our fasting?" The Pharisees were experts at fasting and many of them fasted multiple times a week. And they made a big show about it as they did and Jesus called them hypocrites for it because they fasted for attention. They fasted for clout, that the fasting of the Pharisees, it was really just another way for them to spiritually manipulate the people around them. They wanted to appear so strong and so self-disciplined and so holy and righteous and committed and spiritual that nobody would begin to question them or their authority. And so on the outside, everybody looked up to them. They looked so godly, they looked so devout, but Jesus saw right through them. He saw that they were really twisted and sick. And that's not like something I think many people encounter in our culture today. There's not like these religious, spiritual elites going around bragging about their fasting, but it's interesting that fasting has made a resurgence in our culture recently. Not so much for spiritual reasons, but for health and wellness reasons because there are. There's a lot of health benefits to fasting if you do it properly. And I'm not going to say anything too much about that in general. As long as you are honest about your motivations and as long as you're not trying to impress, show off, as you can stay humble, there's nothing wrong with a person fasting for health or wellness reasons. Now, there are a lot of benefits to it. There is, however, something deeply wrong for doing that, for fasting for those reasons by trying to make everybody else think that you're doing it because you're so super spiritual. And this is what ... God's not dumb. He knows you. He knows the motivations of your heart. He knows if you're fasting for Him or if you're fastening to get abs, right? If you're fasting for God or if you're fasting for like a god-bod, you're not going to pull one over on Him. And what does it profit a man if he gets washboard abs and loses his soul? We're all going to have shredded abs in heaven and that's great. There's nothing wrong with trying to pursue that right now, but be honest with yourself. If you're fasting for those reasons and fasting becomes a part of that process, just be honest about those motivations. Don't be a hypocrite, right? Don't do one thing and say something else. Don't try to create this image of yourself before others. Don't fast for attention. Don't fast to flex your spiritual maturity on the one hand and don't fast to flex your physical self-discipline on the other, trying to make people think that you're great, that you're strong because fasting is not about strength. Fasting, it's not about influence, it's not about clout. That's what the Pharisees got wrong. True fasting is about weakness. It's about brokenness. It's about repentance. It's about reliance on God. It's about awakening yourself physically to the reality of just how weak and dependent on God you really are. So when you fast, and Jesus assumes that you will fast, when you fast, the purpose is to humble yourself spiritually, emotionally, mentally, and physically. And as you do that, the goal is you're just pulling the curtain back on reality enough to see things as they really are, to see how really utterly weak and dependent on God you are. And when you're doing that properly, you're really not going to care if anyone else even notices because your true motivation is you're wanting that intimacy, that closeness, that reliance on God. Matthew 4:1-4, "Jesus was led by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting for 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry and the tempter came to Him and said, 'If you're the Son of God, well, then command these stones to become loaves of bread.' But he answered Him, 'It is written. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" And if you haven't fasted before or if you haven't fasted recently, I would encourage you to make it a commitment to do so soon, but as you do this, this should be your prayer. You should be praying, "God used this time to humble me, to bring me to a place, to help me feel and experience the reality that I am more dependent on You, on Your Spirit, on Your word than I am on the food that my physical body is hungering for right now." Because in reality, that is what is true. And so commit to pray with fasting. Let that become part of your spiritual life. And Jesus says, "In doing so, your Heavenly Father will reward you." Number five, looking at today, is to commit to pray with perspective. Jesus concludes, he goes on, he says, "So therefore, do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroy, where thieves do not break in and steal for where your treasure is there, your heart will be also." Now, I included this last passage here because I think a lot of times we don't think about this in the context of prayer and fasting, but that's the context in which Jesus delivered it. This is a transitional part of Jesus' sermon. And so on the one hand, He's talking about literal treasures. He's talking about possessions and material things, but it's clear that He's talking about more than that. He's talking about immaterial things as well. He's talking about the Pharisees, the religious people who were in their practices storing up for themselves treasures on earth and really missing the point of what they were pursuing. Now, the Pharisees were very devoted. They were devoted to memorizing Scripture. They were devoted to giving to the poor. They were devoted to fasting and prayer, but as we saw, their devotion was motivated by the wrong things. Their devotion was motivated by love for attention, love for authority. They were treasuring their image in their influence. They were storing up these treasures on earth, and in the process, they were selling their souls for things they couldn't keep. Now, the painful irony is that these treasures that they were holding onto, they were really becoming to them like millstones tied around their necks, sinking into the sea, pulling them further and further away from God the Father. And meanwhile, the greatest treasure of all, the treasure that they actually needed, the treasurer that the Father had given was standing right there in front of them, Jesus, the Son of God, the treasure of heaven, our mediator, the one, the only one who could bring them back into the presence of the Father, was standing right in front of them. They couldn't even see it. They were blinded by their self-righteousness. And Jesus told His disciples in John 14:6-7, He said to them, He says, "I am the way and the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father except through Me." And then He said, "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also. And from now on, you do know Him and you have seen Him." This is what the Pharisees couldn't see, that when you know Jesus, you know the Father, that when you know the Father, you're going to treasure the Father because as you seek this Father, you find the Father that treasures you. You find the Father that gave His greatest treasure to seek you, to find you and to bring you back home. He gave up His own beloved Son, Jesus Christ, so that you could be saved. This is why Paul in Romans 8:31, he says, "Well, then what shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?" Do you have that perspective when you pray to the Father? You are praying to the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth, holy and sovereign and He loves you like a father that would give His greatest treasure to have you be reconciled to Him. I decided not to write a conclusion to the sermon today. It felt almost silly to stand up here and talk to you anymore about prayer when we could just spend these last few moments together talking to God together in prayer. And so we are going to do something a little bit different. I'm going to be throwing you a curveball right now, so brace yourselves for it. For the next several minutes, we are going to just be spending time together in prayer. If this like weirds you out, if you've never done anything like this before, don't be nervous. I will give you a pass if you are really uncomfortable praying with other people. You can stay by yourself in your seat and pray silently, but I would encourage you to just step out of that comfort zone this morning. And I want us to just kind of circle up in groups of five, six, seven, eight people and spend a few minutes praying together. And if you've never done this before, don't freak out. You don't need to sound polished, you don't need to sound eloquent. God doesn't care about that. Just relax. It's having a conversation together with our Heavenly Father. And so nobody's going to judge you, don't freak out and we're just going to get together. And as we do, this is what I want you to do. First of all, if you have something in your life that you need prayer for, share that with the people that you're praying with, but then really just spend some time praying for one another, pray for our church and pray for the things that Jesus taught us to pray. The words of the Lord's Prayer are going to be up here on the screen and just meditate on them and pray for these things. And when you look at this, Jesus, He's telling us, He's like, "I want you to pray to Me about the most seemingly insignificant and mundane things, your daily bread. There's nothing too small. Just bring it to Me." And on the other hand, He's telling us, "I want you to also pray for the biggest, most transcendent things that you can even think about. Pray for that God's kingdom would come and that His will would be done here on earth as it is in heaven. Pray about these things together." And so I'm going to close us in prayer. We're going to just split up with some people around you, get into some groups. We're going to spend some time praying together. After a while, the band will come up back up here and lead us and worship. But if you're with us, let's pray and then we'll continue in prayer together. Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. But as I said earlier, I pray that You would teach us to treasure You as we ought and to understand the price that You paid so that we could have a relationship with You, that we could stand before You and know that our prayers are being heard. God, I know that there are people here in this room that have things going on in their lives right now and I know that there are things going on in our world right now that are so big and so complex that they seem hopeless apart from a mighty movement of You, of You working miracles, working wonders among us. And God, we praise You that You are the God who can do just that, that you are the sovereign God of all the universe and You hear us right now. And so, Lord, I pray that You would help us to become a people of prayer. Help us to be a church that knows You and loves You and deeply relies on You as we come together right now. Lord, we do so in the name of Your Son, Jesus Christ, our advocate, our mediator, our good shepherd, our great high priest. We come to You in the name of the One who has overcome Satan, sin and death, is now seated at Your right hand, ruling and reigning from His throne in heaven. Jesus, we pray that You would pour Your Spirit out upon Your church, that You would bring us now into the presence of our Heavenly Father and do so knowing that You are able to do abundantly more than we could ask or even think according to the power that has worked within us. And so Lord, to You be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Prayer and Fasting

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 26, 2023 47:56


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. We are continuing oursermon series today called Committed. We've been talking about the essentialhabits of an abundant life and what we've been saying over and over throughoutthis series is that we are taking a look at some of the essential,nonnegotiable and just super practical commitments that every Christian needsto make in order to grow in their faith and persevere through life and toexperience and to enjoy the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give. And if you were here last week, our teens director, Tyler, did an awesome job talking about our commitment to Scripture and I hope that that sermon just left you with a greater appreciation, a greater trust, a greater hunger and appetite for God's word. It's amazing that we worship a god who speaks, a god who has chosen to reveal Himself to us as His creation and we should never take that for granted, right? If God has something to say, we want to hear it. We want to listen. And it is awesome to think that we have access to the word of God recorded for us in Scripture. We worship a god who speaks. We also worship a god who listens. And this is what we are going to be talking about today as we look at the topics, the commitments of fasting and prayer. Like so many of the things that we've talked about in this series, this is not something we do, it is something we commit to, that fasting and prayer, they're not going to happen by accident, they're not going to happen on their own, that these are things that like the early church we need to devote ourselves to doing. And for some of us, maybe that feels like hard work. I don't know about you, but sometimes prayer could begin to feel like a grind. It could feel like something that you have to do or something that you're supposed to do when really we should view prayer as something that we get to do. And as we learn to do these things properly, even if at times they might feel like a grind, they might feel like a drudgery, they should become our delight, that as we practice them persistently, we find in them a great reward. And I use that word because that's the word that we're going to see Jesus used over and over in our text today when He talks about fasting in prayer. He keeps using this word reward. And so is that a word that you use? Is that a word that you think about when you think about fasting, when you think about prayer? Before we begin this morning, I want you to do something for me right now. I just want you to mentally do a quick evaluation of your prayer life. Rate yourself, scale of one to 10, 10 is everything's great, you've got an abundant, flourishing, vibrant, rewarding prayer life. One is it's dry, it's a grind, barely existence. Your prayer life is on a life support. Does prayer feel like a requirement, like a drudgery, like something that you have to do or does it feel like a reward? Does it feel like a delight, something that you get to do? Wherever you just rated yourself, none of us are a 10, we've all have room to grow and so my hope today is that we can all go up in our rating together. And so if you just said, "Well, I feel like I'm a two or a three," well, what would it take to get from a three to like a seven or to get from a five to a nine? What would it take for us to all grow to have a prayer life that's more like that of Christ Jesus? And lucky for us, this is something that Jesus' disciples wondered as well and they at times would ask Jesus, "Hey, Jesus, can you teach us how to pray?" And He did. On multiple occasions, Jesus taught His disciples how to pray and one of those is the text that we're going to be looking at this morning. It's Matthew chapter six, verse five through 21. This is a part of the sermon on the Mount. And Jesus spends a considerable amount of time teaching His disciples about this topic of fasting and prayer. So we're going to walk through this text together. It's a bit of a long text and we're going to just go through it section by section. And as we do, I want us to look at five commitments that are going to help us to avoid some of the pitfalls of prayer and fasting that we could potentially fall into, but also to just have an increasingly vibrant, abundant, powerful and rewarding prayer life that God wants us to have. So if you have your Bibles, we are in Matthew chapter six, beginning in verse five. The words are also going to be up here on the screen. This is what Jesus said, "And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray and stand in the synagogues and on the street corners that they may be seen by others. And truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who's in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. Pray then like this, 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.' For if you forgive others their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites. They just figure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where mouth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." This is the reading of God's holy word for us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer for our sermon today? God, we pray that we would learn to treasure You as we ought. And God, we pray that You would forgive us for not praying as we ought. Lord, You warned Your disciples in the garden to watch and to pray that they might not enter into temptation for the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is so weak. And God, we confess our weakness to You and we praise You that Your strength, Your power is made perfect in our weakness, that Your grace is greater than our failures. And so Lord, we ask today that You would to teach us to pray as we ought, teach us to live continually in Your presence, experiencing the blessing of knowing that You are always with us and You always hear us, that we can come and we can talk to You at any time. Teach us what it means to be anxious about nothing but to pray about everything because we know that You are with us, You see us, You hear us, You love us and You are able to provide for our every need. Lord, You are the God who hears and I pray that we would marvel at that reality today and we give You thanks and glory for it now, in Jesus' name, amen. All right, well, before teaching His disciples how to pray, Jesus first we see, He teaches them how not to pray and He gives them two examples. He says, "On the one hand, don't go and don't pray like the hypocrites. Don't pray like the Pharisees, the religious people." And on the other hand, He says, "Don't pray like the Gentiles, like the lawless pagans either." And so let's start with the religious people that with the Pharisees in verse five, Jesus says, "When you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray and stand in the synagogues and not at the street corners that they may be seen by others. And truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret and your Father who sees in secret will reward you." Now, first of all, we need to understand Jesus isn't condemning public prayer. He's not saying that there's never an appropriate time for Christians to pray in public with one another. Corporately, we see it in the New Testament that that is something that the early church was devoted to doing, that it is a good thing for God's people to come and to pray together publicly. But what Jesus is telling us and what we all need to be cautious of is this, that if we find in ourselves that we can go to church and pray with other Christians or we can go to community group and we've got a lot of things to say to God and we can pray with lofty words and eloquence and everything sounds very polished, but then we go home. And when we're alone with God in secret, we've got nothing to talk about, well, He says that's a problem. That's a symptom of a pretty serious illness in the diagnosis that he gives is hypocrisy. I think of it like this. I don't know if you've ever been over at a friend's house like hanging out and then somebody you don't know, one of their friends comes in and joins you. Maybe it's a coworker or neighbor or something like that. And at first, everything's great. You're having a good time, hanging out. The conversation is going well and everybody seems friendly and then your friend gets up and leaves the room and now you're trapped in this awkward deafening silence. And a moment ago, we thought, "I thought we were all friends, but now that they're gone, I realize that was an illusion. You are not my friend. I don't even know you. You're a stranger and we've got nothing to say to each other." Well, don't be like that with God. If you are like that with God, that is a cause for concern. If you find it easy to talk to God when other people, other Christians are around, but you can't talk to Him in private, oh, maybe you've fallen into the same pit as the Pharisees and maybe you've figured out how to look really religious and sound really spiritual when other people are around, but there's no real relationship there with God. He says, "Don't fall into that pit. If the pathway to prayer is this narrow road, you've got this dangerous ditch on the one side that the Pharisees fell into," but he says, "But there's also this other ditch on the other side that the Gentiles fall into. So he says, "Don't be like the pagans either," and this is what He talks about in verse seven. He says, when you pray, "Don't just heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words." He says, "Don't be like them as your Father knows what you need even before you ask." See, unlike the Jews who were monotheistic, they believed in one God rightly, the Gentiles believed in a pantheon of gods and their relationship to these gods was not particularly healthy. The gods were seemingly mostly motivated by their own selfish self-interest. And so the people envisioned their gods as these kind of powerful but moody beings and they needed to be appeased. They needed to be persuaded, even maybe bribed in order to care about the plights of mortal people. And their hope was that if they used the right words, if they prayed to the right god with the right words, in the right place, at the right temple with the right idols and the right sacrifices, well, maybe they could get somebody's attention out there. And so they would babble and they would heap up all of these words, as Jesus said, because they were just trying to cover all of their bases like, "If I just do this enough, maybe something will happen. Just throw a plethora of prayers out into the cosmos and hope that maybe somebody out there is listening." And Jesus says, "Don't be like that. Don't be like the Gentiles. The Gentiles weren't just a little-stitious, they're more than a little-stitious. They were superstitious. He says, "Don't be superstitious about prayer. It's not some magic incantation that you need to figure out. Prayer is not a way to tap into some higher power or manipulate some spiritual system. Prayer is just simply a conversation with God. And God is not a system. He is not a power. He is a person." And so I said we'd look at five commitments of a rewarding prayer life. And the first one is that, before anything else, we need to commit to this. We need to pray to God with God as a person. And I use the word with. We often talk about praying to God. Not necessarily anything wrong with that, but I'm using the word with here intentionally for two different reasons. First of all is because the Gentiles prayed to their gods, but they can never really be sure if the gods were listening to them. They could never be sure if anybody out there was hearing that they send their prayers off like an email and who knows? Maybe it just wound up in someone's spam folder. Maybe it just got deleted right away. They could never be sure. But we don't pray like that, that when we pray to God, we pray to a god that we know we have confidence, we have assurance that He is with us, that God is all knowing, all seeing. He is omniscient, omnipresent and all powerful. He always hears all the prayers of His people. And eight times in this passage, Jesus refers to God in a very specific way that shows the intimate relationship that we are to have with Him. He refers to Him as our Father. I mentioned earlier that this passage, it comes from the Sermon of the Mount, and later on in the same sermon, Jesus comes back to this topic of prayer in Matthew chapter seven and He's talking about the relationship of us praying to God as a father. And in verse seven, he says this. He says, "Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks, receives and he who seeks finds and to Him who knocks the door will be opened." And he says, "Or which one of you, if his son asks for bread, we give him a stone, or if he asks for a fish, would give him a serpent? If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, well, then how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him?" I don't know about your dad's situation. Some of you had very good dads, maybe some of you didn't. The point that Jesus is making here though is that even the very best of earthly fathers seems evil when compared to the goodness, the kindness, the grace of our God, our Heavenly Father." And God wants us to know Him as a good Father, as a father who is so good, so loving, so attentive that He not only sees us, He knows what we need even before we ask Him," Jesus says. And Jesus calls God our Father. We need to relate to God as our Father. He also calls Him our Heavenly Father, that we can approach God with the affection and the intimacy of a father, but we must also approach Him with the reverence and the honor and the respect due to a Heavenly Father that our God as a father is perfect in His goodness. He's also perfect in His holiness. He teaches us to pray, "Our Father who arts in heaven, hallowed be Thy name." And so what does it mean to say that God is holy? It means that He is morally perfect in every way. He is completely pure without compromise, without contradiction. He is utterly distinct and set apart with no rival, with no equal for His glory, for His righteousness. And actually when you look at Scripture, what you see is that God is so holy, he is so righteous that anything unrighteous is unable to even stand before His presence, that even the angels of heaven, and when Isaiah has his vision, that they cover their faces before the holiness of God, that God is so righteous that anything containing even an ounce of sin, even the smallest imperfection, it would be destroyed before His holy presence as quickly as a shadow under the direct exposure of the sun. Hebrews 12:28 says, "Therefore, let us offer to God acceptable worship with reverence in awe, for our God is a consuming fire." Well, this is true. How can we, as sinful people, hope to stand before a Holy God in prayer? Well, I mentioned earlier, there's two reasons that we need to not just pray to God but with God. And the first is simply that God is with us as a father, but the second is that we cannot pray to God without God helping us to pray to God, that we cannot come before the Father without the power of the Holy Spirit, without the righteousness of His Son, Jesus Christ. This is what I mean, when we pray to the Father, we do so in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the name of Jesus Christ and we're able to, therefore, come boldly before the throne of God and stand before His righteousness, not because we're righteous. If we did that, we would die, but we are able to stand before His presence because, and only because, we have been covered by the righteous blood of His Son, Jesus Christ, that by grace through faith, the righteousness of Christ has been accredited to us. It covers us and we are able to stand before the Holy Father now and not just live, but to actually be loved, actually be welcomed into ... He looks at us and He sees us in the perfection of Jesus and welcomes us into His presence. And this is what it means to pray to God. It's really profound when you think about it. It is a Trinitarian experience, Father, Son and the Holy Spirit allowing us to come and experience just the awesome transcendent reality that our prayers can be heard by a Holy God. And that as they are and as we do, we realize that this Holy God is also our loving Father. And so commit to that, commit to having that mindset as you approach God, that you are speaking with God for the person that He is, both loving and holy, perfect in His holiness. Secondly, commit to pray with a plan. Jesus says in verse nine, He says, "Pray them like this." He's like, "I'm going to teach you. This is how you should pray. 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven and give us this day our daily bread, forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not unto temptation, but deliver us from evil.'" I think one of the reasons that Christians maybe don't pray as often as they should is because they lack that vision of God and who He is and the person of God that they are communicating with. I think if we had that mindset and we realize what an awesome privilege that is, we would pray more. But I think another reason that a lot of Christians maybe struggle with prayer is that they don't have a practical plan. And so really quick, I just want to look at four super practical things that if you're not doing them already, I would say start doing them and you'll find I think that these are going to help you with your prayer life because Jesus doesn't just say, "If you pray." There is a sense in which we are continually living in the presence of God, praying without ceasing. As we go about our day, we should have this mindset that God is with us. We are talking to Him throughout our day, that we have access to Him at any time, but then we should also plan specific times where we are going to sit down and focus and spend time with God in prayer. And that's not going to happen on its own. You need to have a plan. So first of all, you need to determine a time and a place. If you're a busy person, I don't know if there's busy people that live here in Boston, but if there are, you might need to put this on your calendar. You might need to schedule it. You need to plan ahead and say, "At this time of day, I'm going to stop what I'm doing and I am going to pray and I'm going to have a time, I'm also going to have a place." Where are you going to do it? When are you going? For me, personally, I literally go into my bedroom, I go into to our closet and I close the door. And especially if you got kids, sometimes that's the only way you're going to get any kind of privacy. And I close the door and I pray. And I pray out loud. I don't know why. I started doing this at some point and it helps me to stay focused. It helps my mind not to wander and I'm having a conversation with God, so why wouldn't I pray out loud? Hebrews 5:7 says, "In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplication with loud cries and tears and to Him who was able to save Him from death and He was heard because of His reverence." I don't think that there's anything wrong with praying silently to God, but if you haven't tried praying out loud, I would say it's helpful for me, maybe it will be helpful for you, but the main point is determine a time and a place. Be intentional about it and make it happen. Secondly, use a template. It's not cheating to go into your prayer time with a plan of the kind of things that you're going to pray about. And I know there's a lot of different templates out there and maybe you've used a variety of them throughout your life. One that's really popular that I've heard about is the ACTS model, like the Book of Acts, and they turned it into an acronym, adoration Confession, Thanksgiving and Supplication. And so that's great. That's a good model. You begin adoration. You just spend some time praising God for His attributes like offering Him worship for who He is. A confession, you lead into a time of repentance where you're asking God for forgiveness and confessing your sins to Him. And Thanksgiving, you thank God for His mercy, for His grace, for all of His provision in your life. And then supplication, you bring your requests to God. You lay your heart before Him and you bring Him all your worries, all your concerns, all of your anxieties. Philippians 4:5-7 says, "Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand, so therefore, do not be anxious about anything but in everything. By prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." So that's one model that people like to use and that's great. Me personally, I like to use the Lord's Prayer that we just read. The Lord's Prayer is a beautiful prayer on its own. You should memorize it. As Tyler said last week, you should internalize it. And I don't think that Jesus gave us this prayer to just memorize and then just like mindlessly recite over and over. I think He gave us this prayer as a good template, as a good model of the kind of things that the Father loves and wants to hear from us about. And so that's what I do. I pray through the Lord's Prayer and then I go back through it line by line, theme by theme and get more specific in my prayer time with God. Just personally, I find that really helpful. And then along with that, number three, is keeping a list. And so you've got your template. You keep a list. For me, I just do this in the little notepad app on my phone. Got it with me wherever I go. I got a list of general things that I'm praying about all the time. I pray for my wife, for my marriage, for my kids. I pray for Mosaic. I pray for the pastors, the staff, the community groups, the members of the church. And then as specific things come up in my life and the church's life and the life of people in our community group or whatever, I just add those to that list. Got it with me wherever I go. You do these things, pretty soon you find out you've got plenty of things to pray about that you need to be praying about with God. And fourthly, and this is really important, as you do this, as you make it a priority, you've got your plan, your template, you've got your list of things you're praying about, I record and remember. Sometimes you got to write things down that you're praying about, so that your future self is going to be able to look back and see and remember God's faithfulness throughout that time in your life. And I could give countless examples of this from my life, from members of our community group, but I think this is a good thing to do. Psalm 77 says, "Then I said I will appeal to this. I'll appeal to the year of the right hand of the Most High. I will remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember Your wonders of old. I will ponder all of Your work and meditate on Your mighty deeds. Your way, O, God is holy. What god is great like our God? You are the God who works wonders. You have made known Your might among the peoples." As Christians, we believe this, we know this to be true, that our God is a god who always hears and who always answers all of the prayers of all His people. Nothing gets by Him, nothing gets unnoticed, nothing slips past Him. He always answers our prayers. Now, that doesn't mean that He's always going to say yes to our prayers. He doesn't always answer yes, but He is always going to answer best. He's always going to give us what is most and needed most glorifying to Him. And so when He does, don't just forget it and move on. How many times have you maybe prayed for something and then it happens and you're like, "Oh, probably a coincidence. No." No, don't just move on. Write that down, record it, remember it so that the next time you're praying about something, you can rely on it, so that you can look back because there's going to be some points in your future whereas the psalmist said you're going to need to remember the deeds of the Lord so that you can face the fears in your future with the blessed reminders of God's faithfulness in your past, so that you can then stand firm there in the present. Not because you're strong, but because you know that God is faithful, that He is with you, that He has upheld you and that His hand is upon you. First Peter 5:68 says, "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that the proper time, He may exalt you, casting all of your anxieties on Him because He cares for you." So commit to pray with a plan. Number three, we see in this passage is we need to commit to pray with purity. Jesus says in His prayer, "Forgive us our debts as we've also forgiven our debtors and not and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil," and then he stops and he gives some commentary on this. And in verse 14, he says, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive yours." And now we got to be clear, Jesus is not teaching a model of works-based righteousness here. He's not talking about forgiveness in the context of our justification. We cannot save ourselves by forgiving others. We cannot lose our salvation by failing to forgive others. Jesus, that's not what He's talking about here, but what Jesus is talking about here is He's talking about forgiveness in the context of prayer and in the context of our relationship with God, and therefore, also our relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ. And the warning here is that things are not going to be right and good between you and God the Father if things are not right and good between you and your brothers and sisters in Christ. If you are holding a grudge, if you're holding onto anger, resentment, bitterness, you're refusing to forgive somebody. So don't be surprised then if your prayers are hindered. I guess as a father, I picture it like this. Remember Jesus, He shared that parable, "Hey, if your kid comes and asks for something to eat, you're not going to give them a stone." No, of course not. Why would a good parent withhold something good that their child needed? But let's back up and add some context to that. If your kid came to you and said, "Hey, dad, can I have some dinner?" but on the way to the dinner table, they pushed their sister and suplexed their little brother off of the couch and then they're standing there before you. It's like, "Well, hold on a minute. We got to talk. Yeah, we can talk about food. We can talk about dinner. We got bigger things to talk about like why you just smashed your little brother's face into the coffee table." You get the point. Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mountain, just the chapter before this, in chapter five, verse 23, "If you're offering your gift at the altar and there remember your brother has something against you," he says, "leave your gift there and go. First be reconciled to your brother, then come and offer your gift." This is how important, even if you're in the middle of worship, you're preparing to offer your gift at the altar, you're in the middle of praise and you're in middle of praise is stopped, first go be reconciled, then come and offer your gift. In Psalm 66, the psalmist said, "I cried to Him with my mouth and high praise was on my tongue. If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. But truly God has listened and He has attended to the voice of my prayers." The Apostle Peter talks about this in his first letter, both in chapter three, verse seven and in chapter four, verse seven, Peter says this. First, he speaks to the husbands. He says, "Husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that," what? "So that your prayers may not be hindered." He says, "Husbands, if you want your prayers to not be hindered, well, then you would better be treating God's daughter with the honor, with the tenderness, with the consideration that she deserves." And then in the next chapter, he speaks more generally to all Christians and he says in chapter four, verse seven, "To the end of all things is at hand, therefore, be self-controlled and sober-minded again for the sake of your prayers." Now, earlier when I asked you to rate yourself, your prayer life, if you were finding, if you were saying, "Ah, that's not so good. I'm like a two. I'm maybe a three," you need to maybe stop and ask yourself, "Could this be the reason why? Have I been cherishing iniquity in my heart? Have I been harboring sin, resentment? Have I been holding a grudge? Is there someone that I have been refusing to forgive or is there someone that I need to go to and ask for forgiveness?" Because when you got stuff like this in your life, the last thing that you're going to want to do is go and talk to God in prayer because you know that God knows, and you know that God's not going to let it go. He's going to press you on it. He's going to tell you, "You need to go and you need to deal with this right away." And so you begin to avoid God or you begin to put up a front to mask things, but you know that he sees straight through all of that. So if you're struggling with prayer, be honest. Ask yourself. Are you just going through the motions? Are you avoiding God and could the reason be that there is sin in your life that you know need to deal with, that you've been avoiding? The only way that you're going to dig yourself out of that ditch is to just stop hiding, stop running from God, stop putting up a front, wearing a mask. You just got to go to the Father in faith. You got to go to the Father. You got to just trust. You got to trust that God is going to be more satisfying than whatever sin, whatever iniquity you may have been cherishing in your heart. You got to trust that His way is going to be better than your way, that when you go to Him and you turn and you humble yourself and repent, He's not going to push you away, that He is going to welcome you back with open arms. But we need to commit to pray with purity, without hypocrisy, so that our prayers may not be hindered. Number four, Jesus begins talking about fasting. So committed to pray with fasting. Verse 16 says, "And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. And truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your Father who is in secret and your Father who sees in secret will reward you." Prayer and fasting, oftentimes, we talk about hand in hand. Unlike prayer, fasting is not something we do continually, unceasingly for practical reasons. You will eventually die of starvation if you try to do that. Fasting is a more occasional practice, but just like prayer, Jesus doesn't say, "Hey, if you fast." He says, "When you fast," he expects, he assumes that His disciples are going to fast and the question is not then, "Should we fast." The question is "When we fast, how should we fast? What should be the posture? What should be the motivation of our fasting?" The Pharisees were experts at fasting and many of them fasted multiple times a week. And they made a big show about it as they did and Jesus called them hypocrites for it because they fasted for attention. They fasted for clout, that the fasting of the Pharisees, it was really just another way for them to spiritually manipulate the people around them. They wanted to appear so strong and so self-disciplined and so holy and righteous and committed and spiritual that nobody would begin to question them or their authority. And so on the outside, everybody looked up to them. They looked so godly, they looked so devout, but Jesus saw right through them. He saw that they were really twisted and sick. And that's not like something I think many people encounter in our culture today. There's not like these religious, spiritual elites going around bragging about their fasting, but it's interesting that fasting has made a resurgence in our culture recently. Not so much for spiritual reasons, but for health and wellness reasons because there are. There's a lot of health benefits to fasting if you do it properly. And I'm not going to say anything too much about that in general. As long as you are honest about your motivations and as long as you're not trying to impress, show off, as you can stay humble, there's nothing wrong with a person fasting for health or wellness reasons. Now, there are a lot of benefits to it. There is, however, something deeply wrong for doing that, for fasting for those reasons by trying to make everybody else think that you're doing it because you're so super spiritual. And this is what ... God's not dumb. He knows you. He knows the motivations of your heart. He knows if you're fasting for Him or if you're fastening to get abs, right? If you're fasting for God or if you're fasting for like a god-bod, you're not going to pull one over on Him. And what does it profit a man if he gets washboard abs and loses his soul? We're all going to have shredded abs in heaven and that's great. There's nothing wrong with trying to pursue that right now, but be honest with yourself. If you're fasting for those reasons and fasting becomes a part of that process, just be honest about those motivations. Don't be a hypocrite, right? Don't do one thing and say something else. Don't try to create this image of yourself before others. Don't fast for attention. Don't fast to flex your spiritual maturity on the one hand and don't fast to flex your physical self-discipline on the other, trying to make people think that you're great, that you're strong because fasting is not about strength. Fasting, it's not about influence, it's not about clout. That's what the Pharisees got wrong. True fasting is about weakness. It's about brokenness. It's about repentance. It's about reliance on God. It's about awakening yourself physically to the reality of just how weak and dependent on God you really are. So when you fast, and Jesus assumes that you will fast, when you fast, the purpose is to humble yourself spiritually, emotionally, mentally, and physically. And as you do that, the goal is you're just pulling the curtain back on reality enough to see things as they really are, to see how really utterly weak and dependent on God you are. And when you're doing that properly, you're really not going to care if anyone else even notices because your true motivation is you're wanting that intimacy, that closeness, that reliance on God. Matthew 4:1-4, "Jesus was led by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting for 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry and the tempter came to Him and said, 'If you're the Son of God, well, then command these stones to become loaves of bread.' But he answered Him, 'It is written. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" And if you haven't fasted before or if you haven't fasted recently, I would encourage you to make it a commitment to do so soon, but as you do this, this should be your prayer. You should be praying, "God used this time to humble me, to bring me to a place, to help me feel and experience the reality that I am more dependent on You, on Your Spirit, on Your word than I am on the food that my physical body is hungering for right now." Because in reality, that is what is true. And so commit to pray with fasting. Let that become part of your spiritual life. And Jesus says, "In doing so, your Heavenly Father will reward you." Number five, looking at today, is to commit to pray with perspective. Jesus concludes, he goes on, he says, "So therefore, do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroy, where thieves do not break in and steal for where your treasure is there, your heart will be also." Now, I included this last passage here because I think a lot of times we don't think about this in the context of prayer and fasting, but that's the context in which Jesus delivered it. This is a transitional part of Jesus' sermon. And so on the one hand, He's talking about literal treasures. He's talking about possessions and material things, but it's clear that He's talking about more than that. He's talking about immaterial things as well. He's talking about the Pharisees, the religious people who were in their practices storing up for themselves treasures on earth and really missing the point of what they were pursuing. Now, the Pharisees were very devoted. They were devoted to memorizing Scripture. They were devoted to giving to the poor. They were devoted to fasting and prayer, but as we saw, their devotion was motivated by the wrong things. Their devotion was motivated by love for attention, love for authority. They were treasuring their image in their influence. They were storing up these treasures on earth, and in the process, they were selling their souls for things they couldn't keep. Now, the painful irony is that these treasures that they were holding onto, they were really becoming to them like millstones tied around their necks, sinking into the sea, pulling them further and further away from God the Father. And meanwhile, the greatest treasure of all, the treasure that they actually needed, the treasurer that the Father had given was standing right there in front of them, Jesus, the Son of God, the treasure of heaven, our mediator, the one, the only one who could bring them back into the presence of the Father, was standing right in front of them. They couldn't even see it. They were blinded by their self-righteousness. And Jesus told His disciples in John 14:6-7, He said to them, He says, "I am the way and the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father except through Me." And then He said, "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also. And from now on, you do know Him and you have seen Him." This is what the Pharisees couldn't see, that when you know Jesus, you know the Father, that when you know the Father, you're going to treasure the Father because as you seek this Father, you find the Father that treasures you. You find the Father that gave His greatest treasure to seek you, to find you and to bring you back home. He gave up His own beloved Son, Jesus Christ, so that you could be saved. This is why Paul in Romans 8:31, he says, "Well, then what shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?" Do you have that perspective when you pray to the Father? You are praying to the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth, holy and sovereign and He loves you like a father that would give His greatest treasure to have you be reconciled to Him. I decided not to write a conclusion to the sermon today. It felt almost silly to stand up here and talk to you anymore about prayer when we could just spend these last few moments together talking to God together in prayer. And so we are going to do something a little bit different. I'm going to be throwing you a curveball right now, so brace yourselves for it. For the next several minutes, we are going to just be spending time together in prayer. If this like weirds you out, if you've never done anything like this before, don't be nervous. I will give you a pass if you are really uncomfortable praying with other people. You can stay by yourself in your seat and pray silently, but I would encourage you to just step out of that comfort zone this morning. And I want us to just kind of circle up in groups of five, six, seven, eight people and spend a few minutes praying together. And if you've never done this before, don't freak out. You don't need to sound polished, you don't need to sound eloquent. God doesn't care about that. Just relax. It's having a conversation together with our Heavenly Father. And so nobody's going to judge you, don't freak out and we're just going to get together. And as we do, this is what I want you to do. First of all, if you have something in your life that you need prayer for, share that with the people that you're praying with, but then really just spend some time praying for one another, pray for our church and pray for the things that Jesus taught us to pray. The words of the Lord's Prayer are going to be up here on the screen and just meditate on them and pray for these things. And when you look at this, Jesus, He's telling us, He's like, "I want you to pray to Me about the most seemingly insignificant and mundane things, your daily bread. There's nothing too small. Just bring it to Me." And on the other hand, He's telling us, "I want you to also pray for the biggest, most transcendent things that you can even think about. Pray for that God's kingdom would come and that His will would be done here on earth as it is in heaven. Pray about these things together." And so I'm going to close us in prayer. We're going to just split up with some people around you, get into some groups. We're going to spend some time praying together. After a while, the band will come up back up here and lead us and worship. But if you're with us, let's pray and then we'll continue in prayer together. Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. But as I said earlier, I pray that You would teach us to treasure You as we ought and to understand the price that You paid so that we could have a relationship with You, that we could stand before You and know that our prayers are being heard. God, I know that there are people here in this room that have things going on in their lives right now and I know that there are things going on in our world right now that are so big and so complex that they seem hopeless apart from a mighty movement of You, of You working miracles, working wonders among us. And God, we praise You that You are the God who can do just that, that you are the sovereign God of all the universe and You hear us right now. And so, Lord, I pray that You would help us to become a people of prayer. Help us to be a church that knows You and loves You and deeply relies on You as we come together right now. Lord, we do so in the name of Your Son, Jesus Christ, our advocate, our mediator, our good shepherd, our great high priest. We come to You in the name of the One who has overcome Satan, sin and death, is now seated at Your right hand, ruling and reigning from His throne in heaven. Jesus, we pray that You would pour Your Spirit out upon Your church, that You would bring us now into the presence of our Heavenly Father and do so knowing that You are able to do abundantly more than we could ask or even think according to the power that has worked within us. And so Lord, to You be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Scripture

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 19, 2023 52:21


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com To get our minds set and our hearts set on what it means for Christians to be committed to scripture, I'm going to read a quote for us from John Wesley and I'll read it and then I'll make a couple comments on it. But John Wesley says this about scripture, "I want to know one thing, the way to heaven, how to land safe on that happy shore. God himself has condescended to teach the way; for this very end He came from heaven. He has written it down in a book. Oh, give me that book. At any price, give me the book of God. I have it. Here is knowledge enough for me. Let me be a man of one book." I love this quote. I'm going to add one thing to it. Amen and yes to all of this, but it's not just about how it'll land safe on that happy shore. It's also about how we are called to live while we wait for that day to come. Praise God that He has given us a book to instruct us about the way to heaven and eternity with him. Praise God that that same book tells us what to do while we wait. So with that, I just want us to be thinking and meditating upon what does it mean to be characterized as men or women of one book? That when we call ourselves Christians, we are truly committed to this book, the scriptures, the Bible, God's word, and that is a part of who we are. So with that, will you pray with me over the preaching of God's word? Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you so much that you have given us this book. You are word, your scriptures, the Bible. We thank you that you speak to us directly, plainly, clearly. We thank you that we have the privilege to be able to read this book whenever we desire. Lord, change our hearts. Encourage our hearts to love you more and specifically by loving your word more, by listening to your word, by submitting to your word, by committing to your word in our lives and trusting what you teach us in it more than ourselves. Lord, we thank you and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Alrighty. Today we will be spending the majority of our time in 2 Timothy chapter 3 verses four 14 through 17. We will be referencing a lot of scripture as we go into here. Really when I was preparing for this, all I wanted to do was open up the Bible on my computer, hit control A, copy paste, there's my sermon notes. We'd be here for a long time and that's culturally unacceptable. So I decided to narrow it down a little bit. But I bring this up to say that if any of the topics that we address today are interesting to you and you think, "Man, I want to know more, I want to learn more about it," there are a ton of scriptures that deal with the topics will address today. So I encourage you to study scripture, to go to scripture and study and see what it has to say about whatever the things are that we're talking about that you would like to know more about. So I also bring it up to say we're going to go through a lot. So hope you had your coffee, hope you're ready to go and let's dig into God's word. So starting in 2 Timothy chapter 3, verses 14 through 17, it says this, "But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed knowing from whom you've learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." This is the reading of God's holy, unerring, authoritative and fallible word. May He write these eternal truths upon our hearts. We're going to be spending our time in three points today. First point is that scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. Secondly, that scripture is breathed out by God. And thirdly, that scripture is able to equip you for every good work. So point number one, scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. I just read it, I'm going to read it again. This is verses 14 and 15 where it says, "But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you've learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus." So if you'll bear with me for a quick aside, something that really stood out to me in this text that I would like to address is that it says, "Timothy, you have been acquainted with the scriptures from a young age. And it has, you have been made known of Him." So okay, what's going on here? The first chapter of this book tells us that Timothy was taught the scriptures from his grandmother and his mother. If you're like me, the question is, "Well, what about his father?" Scripture tells us in the Book of Acts that his father was not a Christian and we don't have the whole story, but from what we know from beginning to end it, we believe that his father was never saved. By God's grace He may have and we pray that He was, but we have no idea. I bring this up to say a few things. First, to give a charge to parents and second to give a charge to kids. Parents, don't be afraid to make your kids acquainted with scripture. We live in a day and age where we like to say, "I'll let my kids figure it out for themselves. I'll let them decide. I don't want to bias them in anything." What we're going to talk about in the sermon, how scripture is life and it is life giving. So if you have something that gives life, why would you withhold that from your children? Think about it this way. If you said, "I bought food. I'm going to eat my food and I'll let my kids figure out how they're going to eat. They can ask me what I personally like to eat. They can ask me what I bought to eat and I'll tell them all about what I like to eat and why I eat it, and I'll tell them all that, but I'll let them figure it out for themselves." Child services would be called on you. That's not loving. It's not helpful to them. If we truly believe that scripture is life giving, we should want to raise our kids in it to know it. And now, kids and teenagers, let your parents teach you the scriptures, trust them. Trust that it is life and they are seeking your wellbeing and your good in it. So allow them to teach you and desire it for yourself. Seek after desire to know scripture yourself. The last thing I want to address in this little tangent of mine... Sermon's not over yet, sorry. But the last thing I want to address in this tangent is I want to address single mothers and women who are married and they are a Christian and their husband is not. I want to tell you, take encouragement from scripture. God is with you. God loves you and He cares for you and He has given you the ability to equip your child to follow the Lord, that when scripture tells us that fathers are called to lead their family spiritually about when they fail, whether from death, from disease, from abandonment, from not being around to begin with, mothers, you are still loved and cared for and equipped to raise your child and even more so the need for scripture is needed. So I just want to encourage you, mothers, rely on scripture. When life gets hard and it's hard to raise a kid, depend on scripture and depend on the church. But scripture is able to equip you in that as well. So there's my brief aside. Sorry about that. Point number one, scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. That's the text that we just read. It ends with saying it's able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. So point, first thing we got to figure out in here is the word able. It says that scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. It's not a guarantee, but it is powerful to do it. It doesn't mean that just because you read this book you're going to instantly know what it means to be saved, but it has the power to do it if you submit to it and trust it. The second thing that I want to point out is that it says it's able to make you wise for salvation. It's not going to save you in and of itself. You can't read this book and say, "Oh, I read this book, I'm good to go. I'm saved now." No, that's not how it works. But it is able to make us wise, to show us to open our eyes to the message of the gospel through faith in Christ Jesus, right? Christ Jesus is the one who saves. I could quote the entirety of scripture and show you how it points to this concept. I'm just going to read one in Acts chapter 4, verse 12, speaking of Jesus, it says this, "And there is salvation in no one else for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." What's scripture is all about, what it's all pointing to is Christ, and that He alone gives us salvation. Through His life, His death and resurrection on the cross, He has paid the penalty for our sins. And through our faith in him, we can be saved. No other name, no other religion, no other concept or ideology or thoughts or way of life can save us. Nothing but Christ alone. And so scripture is able to make us wise to that because it's what it talks about. That's what this whole book is about. And Jesus knew this. What I find so interesting about this idea is that Jesus used scripture in this way to make people wise for salvation. Well, what do I mean by that? So the gospel, very clearly, that Jesus Christ is fully God. He came to earth and died on the cross because of our sins that when we rebelled, we transgress, we reject God. We sinned against him and the penalty for that sin is death, eternity apart from God. And Jesus came to die and take that penalty for us so that through faith in him saying, "Jesus, you saved me from my sins. You lived a perfect life, died to pay that penalty and raised to prove that you are God. I trust in you because I need you to save me. I can't do it on my own." Jesus did that. He was raised from the dead. Fact. And then He comes across two of His disciples walking on a road to a maze and the disciples are sad and they're talking to one another. They're sad because Jesus just died. And Jesus sees them and talks to them and they don't recognize him. And Jesus goes to them, "What are you talking about? Why are you guys sad?" And they're like, "Don't you know anything that's going on in the world today. Aren't you up to date? This guy Jesus that we've all been following? He just died. What are we supposed to do with our lives? We've been following him. He's dead. What do we do?" Well, as Jesus is talking to them, what does He do? Does He go and say, "Hey guys, it's me. I'm live. You don't have to be sad anymore"? No, He doesn't. We see in Luke chapter 24 what Jesus says to them, in chapter 24, verse 25, "And He said to them, 'Oh, foolish ones and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into His glory?' And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, He interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself." What Jesus chooses to do is to say, "Let's read the scriptures together. We all agree that this is God's words. Let's read it and I'll show you how all of it points to Jesus Christ." So if you're here today and you're not a Christian, maybe you're here just seeking questions, have thoughts, we're glad you're here. Maybe you're here because you just have this feeling that you're supposed to be here, you want to be here, a friend invited you, we're glad that you're here. Thank you for coming. I want to challenge you. If you are seeking after God, read this book. Read this book. Ask God to reveal himself to you from this book. It's not going to save you. Reading this book isn't going to save you, but it is able to open our eyes. It is powerful enough to open our eyes to the reality of Christ as our savior and our need for him. So if you're not a Christian, that's my challenge. Read this book, start reading it and see what it says about Christ and salvation. Point number two, scripture is breathed out by God. This is from verse 16 in our text, the first part of it where it says, "All scripture is breathed out by God." So a couple things we need to clarify here. What is meant by all of scripture? This is one of the times where I love to point out Greek words and like, "This is what they mean." The Greek word for all means all. It's very plain is what it means. It's all of it. It's this whole book, the whole cannon of scripture. Now, I can stand up here and go through historical arguments, scientific arguments, scholarly arguments and things like that to show you why this is the scripture. This is the whole of it. But I'm not going to do that because I believe God's word is powerful enough on its own. And if you read this book, it'll prove it's scriptureness, it's divinity, it's holiness to you. So I'm not going to defend it in that way, but I will give you just like a little bit of information that that might be helpful. So first, when we say all scripture, we're talking about the Old and New Testament, so this book, the Bible. And if you have questions about the canonicity, the completeness of the Old Testament, I just want to encourage you that scholars and historians have never really questioned this. This is not really something that's ever been debated. It's been solidified for a very long time. If you want to know more about that, I encourage you to study it, to look it up. You can talk to me afterwards. But Josephus was a Jewish historian. He was not a Christian, but a Jewish historian at the time of Christ. This is what he says about the Old Testament canon of scriptures. He says, "For although such long ages have now passed, no one has ventured neither to add or to remove or to alter a syllable." What he was saying is for as long as we can study history, as long back as he was able to find, no one has dared change or add anything to the cannon of the Old Testament because everyone knew that this was the scriptures. It's the same scriptures that we have as our Old Testament today where most people have questions comes to the New Testament. I just want to tell you that the books of the New Testament were largely decided by three things. First, the divine qualities, the idea that they were written by God and speak of God truthfully. The reception by the churches, did people at the time when they were written actually believe that they were scripture? And third connection to an apostle, connection to someone who saw the life of Christ. So I'm just going to point out two places where the New Testament affirms its canonicity. In 1 Timothy chapter 5, verse 18, Paul writing a first letter to Timothy says this, "For the scripture says, 'You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages'." This is an idea that is from the Old Testament, but it's not a quote from the Old Testament. The idea is consolidated to this quote by Jesus in the books of Matthew and of Luke. So Paul writing this letter is affirming the gospels as scripture. He's saying we in the church at that time believe that the gospels are divine quality, are of equal value of scripture as the whole of the Old Testament. So the church in the early days accepted the gospels as scripture. Second one I want to point out is 2 Peter chapter 3 verses 15 and 16, where Peter says, "And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you, according to the wisdom given him as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction as they do the other scriptures." I'm pointing this one out because for some reason Paul is the one we have the most difficulty with in modern times, and it's not for some reason. It's the reason that it says here, he says hard things which we don't like, and so we twist them. But Peter makes a couple of points here. First, he points out that... Excuse me. Paul is writing from wisdom given to him. It's not his own wisdom, it's not his own thoughts. It's the wisdom of the Holy Spirit that has been given to him that Paul is writing these letters. Then he says, "Just like every other scripture, people are going to twist it." This is a statement confirming the canonicity, the authority, the scripture or nature of Paul's letters saying that, "Yeah, Paul's letters are scriptures. And just like all of the other scriptures, people naturally are going to try and twist them to fit their own desires." And so people like to say, "I believe in the canon of scripture minus Paul. Just get rid of Paul and I accept the rest of it." Well, if you accept the rest of it, you have to accept that Peter calls those letters of Paul scripture. And so you have to submit to them as scripture as well. I could go on and on forever about this. I'm not going to. If you have more thoughts or questions about the canonicity of scripture, I encourage you to study it and feel free to talk to us and people in your community groups about it. But, that's what we mean by all scripture. We're talking about this book. Every single part of it is breathed out by God. Well, what do we mean by breathed out by God? It means kind of three things, but first is that it's inspired by God. It originates from God himself. We see this idea in 2 Peter chapter 1 verses 20. Peter says this, "Knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." So Peter is telling us, "What is scripture? What are the things written in there?" Yes, men physically wrote them down, penned them, but they were speaking from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was guiding them, was directing their thoughts, their minds, their heart and saying, "This is what God wants you to tell people" and they just wrote it down. So when we talk about scripture as a breathed out by, we say it's holy, unerring, authoritative, divinely inspired is what we're getting at. We're saying that this is from God. It's not a message that men have to tell other people. It's a message that God has to tell us. The second thing that it means for scripture to be breathed out by God is that it is alive. In scripture when we see God breathing, it's not just because He's like out of breath huffing and puffing or anything like that. It's He's doing something with it. He's giving life. We see this most clearly in Genesis chapter 2, verse 7 when God creates man, creates Adam. It says, "Then the Lord God formed the man of the dust of the ground." Dust is not alive, dust is dead. "And breathe into His nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature." This word is alive. Do we know that scripture is alive? Well, what do we mean? I'm not saying it's going to jump out of my hand and start attacking or talking or doing. That's not what we're talking about. Well, Hebrews clarifies for us what does it mean for the word of God to be living. It says, "For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit of joints and of marrow and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart." Scripture is alive. It is living, meaning it's always relevant. It's never going to not apply. Why? Because it's sharper than any two-edged sword. It can pierce through culture. It could pierce through personality. It could pierce through ideologies and thoughts and mentalities and upbringings and get to the heart of all of the issues. It will always be relevant because it speaks upon what actually matters in life. This is something that people like to debate or throw out there. Not even debate. All the time it's like, "It's an old book. It's not really relevant anymore." My favorite thought on this is from Voltaire. I don't know how many of you are familiar with him, but he's a French theologian and a really smart, brilliant guy, loved the concept of a God existing so long as that God didn't tell him how to do anything or have any impact on his life. This is what Voltaire says about scripture. In 1776, he says, "100 years from my day," so 1876, "there will not be a Bible on earth except one that is looked upon by an antiquarian curiosity seeker." By 1876, Voltaire promise that a Bible's not going to exist except by the people who like weird old stuff. They'll have a Bible just for curiosity's sake. Well Voltaire, you're wrong. You're very wrong. I didn't mention this in first service, but he died a few years after this and his house was bought by the French Bible printing company and they used it to print even more Bible. So anyway, that's just God's humor in all of this. But why? Scripture. It seems so outdated. It doesn't speak to the things that culture likes. Cultures move past this. We've progressed. Why would it still exist? Because it's true and it speaks to our hearts. It speaks to us on a level that only God can pierce through everything going on in our lives and speak directly to us. This is what it means for scripture to be alive. The third thing that it means for scripture to be breathed out is that it gives life. It gives life. In Matthew chapter 4, Jesus says, "But He answered them, 'It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God'." We can do everything we're supposed to physically. We can eat right, we can exercise, drink water, stay hydrated, do everything that we can to prolong our life here on earth, and without God's word, we've never really lived. We can do everything to extend our life on earth, but apart from the salvation that comes from Christ that we are made wise to from the scriptures, the eternal life is one of death. Only through the power and the saving work of Christ can our eternal life breathe life. I was convicted in the middle of first service. So if you guys know, God's convicted my heart of sinfulness and reminded me how much I love bread. It says, "More man shall not live by bread alone." God reminded me in college before I cared about my health at all because I wasn't married yet, so I didn't affect anybody else. I would just buy a loaf of bread for dinner and just eat it with olive oil, garlic, Parmesan. Anyways, I'm hungry. Bread is so good. There is nothing better to eat than warm, fresh out of the oven, good bread. This is incredible stuff, guys. Praise God for bread. Amen. We need to love God's word more than that. Amen. I clarified in first service, as much as I loved bread, we need to love scripture more than that because maybe you don't feel the same. But the idea is that God's word will actually give life. It enables us to live a life of abundance here on earth, but also it leads us to a life of faithfully following the Lord an eternal blessing and reward for following him. And so if we actually believe God's word, the scriptures is breathed out by God, it is alive, it is from God, and it is able to give us life, we should really like this word, like to read it, like to study it, want to know it. This is what the early church exampled or lived like to show us. In the Book of Acts in chapter 2, a couple weeks ago we had a sermon on committed to a local church. We talked through the end of Acts after the Pentecost what did the local church look like. This text is 100% absolutely about needing to be committed to a local church, but I want to read it to us and I want you to focus on where does it talk about scripture in how the early church lived immediately after the Pentecost. In Acts chapter 2, starting in verse 42 it says, "And they, Christians, devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and the fellowship to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul. Many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. And day by day attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved." So yes, this text is about commitment to a local church and what the early church looked like, but it's bracketed by scripture. It starts off that the early church devoted themselves to the apostles teaching. They devoted themselves to the words and teachings of the apostles, what we have written down and recorded as of the New Testament. And then it ends in day by day attending temple together. Well, what happened at temple? Yes, there was community events and things like that, but primarily what happened is that people were reading aloud the words of the scriptures and we're teaching upon the scriptures. And day by day they went to hear it. This is how much the early church was committed to scripture that even though manuscripts and copies weren't widely known and available to people, they were willing to travel and go to hear it every day. Now, the city of Jerusalem, where they would go was broken into different sections for sort of the higher ups and the lower ups, most of the people in the church were just common men and women. The common men and women lived in the lower part of the city that was a half mile walk upstairs, up a mountain. They had stairs though. So upstairs to get to the temple to be able to hear the word of God preached. Now if you're here and you're like, "I live in Boston. I walk more than a half mile every day, that's no problem," good. Then why is it so hard for us to take two steps to find the Bible in our room, in our home, in our apartments, wherever it may be? Oh, just take the phone out of our pockets and be like, "Oh, there's the Bible app." Why is it so hard for us to read God's word? If we truly believe it is breath of God, it is life and God's words, we should want to hear it all the time as much as we can. We should not let the Bible app on our phone be the least used app on our phone and we shouldn't let the Bible be the book collecting dust on our shelves. We should want it, we should desire it, we should love it and seek after it. Point number three is that scripture is able to equip you for every good work. This is verses 16 and 17 in our text. This is where the big thrust of this text comes in and it says, "All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." First thing I want to address here is the phrase man of God. What is meant when Paul writes that the man of God may be complete? Well, the context of this book is that Paul is writing this letter to Timothy who is a pastor and a preacher in the church. And so he is writing to him specifically about how to lead and run a church. That's why we call these books a pastoral epistle, is what we call them. And so the idea is that pastors, preachers, people in ministry, missionaries, whoever is charged by God for the work of God, you need to be rooted in scripture. You need to let scripture work on you first before you are able to preach it to others. But it's more than that. It's more than that. The phrase man of God is actually an Old Testament phrase for any person that God sent with a message to deliver. If someone, a prophet was given a message, words by God and said, "Go tell this to someone," they were referred to as the man of God. So if you're sitting here and like, "Good. Wooh! This is for pastors and preachers and missionaries. Great," you're not excused either. None of us are. Because if you remember, a few weeks ago we talked about the Great Commission. Matthew chapter 28, verse 18 and 20, it says, "And Jesus came and said to them, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age'." We've talked about how this is a charge for every Christian. So if you're a Christian here today, you have a message from God, the gospel, that you are called and sent to go and proclaim. And so if you want to be equipped, if you want to be complete to do that work, your life needs to be rooted in scripture, needs to have scripture as its foundation because it is what equips us to do what God has told us and sent us to do. How does it do it? Paul gets into this sort of four phase step of how scripture equips us and it's by teaching, by reproof, correction, and training. So what does it meant by teaching? Well, teaching is essentially information-based. You can think of it that way, that it's scripture tells us, teaches us what God is like, who He is, what is righteous, what is good, what is sinful, what is bad. It gives us that information and we should know it. We should desire to know it. And then because we are sinful people, that information will reproof us. I don't know the last time you heard the word reproof in day-to-day conversation. I don't think I've ever heard it outside of a church. But the word is essentially convicting. We are convicted by it. It's literally the process of trying someone as guilty. It's like, "You're guilty. We're going to put you to the test to show that you're guilty." I think of the Salem witch trials if they were actually all guilty, and it's just like, "You're guilty. We're going to prove that you're guilty to everybody. Okay, you're guilty." Essentially, it is what it is. Scripture convicts us in that way. We are sinful. When we read God's word, it shows us, "Oh, God wants me to be like that? I'm not like that. I'm sinful. I've fallen short." And it should convict us. It should change our thoughts and ideas about how we live so that we want to live more like Christ. And so if reading scripture doesn't convict us, there could be a few things going on in our lives. First thing is maybe you haven't understood the weight of the gospel, right? The weight of the gospel is that our sin, the things that we have done wrong, transgressed God with, is what put Christ on the cross in the first place. It is the reason why Christ God needed to die. That should convict us when we think about the weight of our sins. But we are sinful people, so we aren't always convicted of our sin because we're not perfect. And so maybe we're not convicted of sin when we read scripture because we have what a psychiatrist and therapists call main character syndrome. Main character syndrome is the idea that when you watch a movie or read a book, you just naturally insert yourself in the place of the main character. That's why these things are written most of the time. We can't do that with scripture. You can't. We're not the main character of scripture. Jesus is. Jesus is the main character. Again, we already talked about how scripture is all about Jesus and His salvation to us. So it does apply to us. It is relevant to us, but it's not primarily about us. And so if we read scripture as a main character, we're like, "Wow, this Jesus guy is pretty good. It makes me feel good about myself. I must be pretty good too. All right, I guess I'm good." We can't do that with scripture. We have to let scripture convict us. The third reason why we might not be convicted when we read scripture of our sin is we have itching ears. "Itching ears. What does that mean? What's going on there?" This is what Paul tells Timothy to be warned, be careful of, in the next chapter of his letter. In this chapter, he is focusing on Timothy's need for scripture for his edification in and of himself. In the next chapter, he says, "You must then preach it. You need to preach scripture. It is the best thing for preaching.' And then in chapter 4, verse 2, he says this, "For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but will have itching ears. They will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths." Christians, we can't have itching ears. We can't say, "Ooh, scripture says that. I don't like that so I'm going to find someone who says something different and I'll listen to them." Or, "Ooh, this part of scripture says what I like and that part doesn't so I'm just going to not think about that part and I'll just focus on this part that I like." We can't have ears that we want to scratch with whatever we feel is right and we want to hear. We need to have ears that humbly come to scripture and say, "Ooh, I don't like that. Why? What's that convicting me of? What's it challenging me of? Why am I so disturbed by this text? It is the word of God, so what do I need to change?" Scripture is able to inform us about God and about righteousness and about life, but it is going to convict us then when we see our sinfulness and our fallenness. But we don't stay there. We don't stay there. So the next point is correction. Correction, I think, we all think of as a negative word. Like you're correctional facilities, that's bad. It sounds bad. Literally, it's to improve. It's to change. It's a good thing. It has a positive connotation. We can correct. We can change. When we see sin in our lives, we don't have to stay that way. I love this verse. 1 John chapter 1, verse 9 it says, "If we confess our sins, He, Jesus is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." So when we're studying scripture and we learn that we are sinful and we are convicted of sin in our hearts, what do we do? We go to Christ and we confess it to him knowing that he is faithful and just to forgive us. He will forgive us. We don't have to stay in it and don't have to stay in our guilt and shame. Then he also cleanses us. I love that. He cleanses us. So he removes it from us. We aren't that anymore. It's not who we are. We can change. We can grow. We can mature in our lives and in our faith. This process then will mature us. And that's the last thing that Paul talks about is training in righteousness. The word training is the idea of disciplined, but it's also of parenting. It's the same word that is used for parenting, for raising up in maturity. Scripture is profitable for raising us up in spiritual maturity. Well, how does it do this? Psalm one 19 verse 11, it says, "I have stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you." Joshua 1:8, "This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it." So as we are training, as we are preparing to grow in maturity of our faith, to grow in faithful obedience as we've been talking about in the Roman sermon series before this, we need to have God's word stored up in our hearts and not let it depart from our mouths. Why? It does both sides of the coin, that we might not sin against God. It helps us fight sin, and that we may be careful to do according to all that is written. That we can actively do what is right. Scripture has the power to discipline, to change us, to train us up in maturity and it has the ability to help us fight temptation and sin, right? The thing that prevents us from growing in maturity is when we fall back into sin, when we sin and we sin and we don't recognize, we don't repent, or we just keep falling back into sin. Scripture is there to help us in those moments, to fight off sin in the first place and to encourage us when we have failed. And Jesus knew this. Jesus' primary weapon against temptation was scripture. In the New Testament, Jesus is tempted by Satan. He is tempted. And the first time Jesus says, "No, for it is written." And then Satan's like, "Okay, I'll tempt to you a different way." And Jesus says, "No, for it is written." And a third time Satan tempts him and Jesus says, "Be gone, Satan! For it is written." This is where I get to talk about memorization of scripture. I don't really like that word. I'm sorry. If you are great at memorizing scripture, great. Praise God. That's awesome. I prefer the word internalize. We need to internalize scripture. It's good to memorize. Do. I encourage you. Do memorize scripture. Know it. That's great. But if someone's like, "Ph, what does this verse say?" and you're able to repeat it to them, that's awesome. And then if they ask you, "But what does it mean?" and you're like, "Oh, I don't know," that's not very helpful. And if they're like, "Well, how does that apply to your life?", you're like, "Ah, beats me," that's not helpful. That's not what scripture is talking about. We store it up in our hearts. We internalize it. We make it a part of who we are. We let it transform us so that way when temptations come, we can say "No, for is written." I think when I've heard that section of Jesus' temptation preached on most, it's often just memorize scripture. It's good. Good. Good to know the scripture. But do you have specific scriptures prepared to fight against specific temptations? We are all sinful people. Let's not pretend we're not. We are. We all have different struggles and different temptations. So whatever it is, whatever sin you are struggling with, you are dealing with, study scripture and what does scripture say about that. So that way the next time temptation comes, you're ready. I think when temptation comes, our primary response is to just ignore it and try and delay it. That never works. To muster up emotional strength within us like, "I'm going to fight against this. I'm just going to be tough and stand here and not moved." Or it's to just, "Oh, well, whatever. That's the worst." But do we do what Jesus did? Actively say scripture. Don't be afraid to say it out loud. You might sound weird for a little bit, but that's okay. But there's power in words. So when temptation comes say, "No, Satan! Be gone, Satan! For it is written." And have scripture ready. Know scripture. Be prepared with scripture to be able to fight against temptation. This scripture, as we study and as we meditate on it and internalize it, it will encourage us in this process because even still, we'll fall short. We'll fall to temptations, we will sin, but scripture will then still encourage us. And this is Romans chapter 15, verse 4, it says, "For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us so that through the endurance taught in scriptures and the encouragement they provide, we might have hope." One of the ways Satan likes to have power over us in that temptation is that when we fall, when we sin, he wants to lead us to despair, to lead us to guilt, to say, "Ah, I just stuck in it. I've messed up a lot," or, "I'm just here. I can't get out." It's when we need scripture. We need scripture to preach truth to us that there is endurance. We are able to endure. And there is encouragement within God's word to help us to have hope. Even when we fail, even when we fall short, no matter what is going on in our lives or what temptation we face, we can always have hope. When we're lacking that hope, we should go to scripture and study it and seek it and ask God, "Give us hope in these situations." Really this four stages of teaching, reproof, correction, and training, it perfectly exemplifies what I was taught as the cycle of growth. This cycle of growth was something that I was taught at a teen's conference of how do we do ministry to teenagers. And I was like, "This is silly. Everybody needs to hear this. This should just be everywhere, not just for teenagers." But it's called the cycle of growth because it's how we are called to grow. The first step of it is unconscious incompetence. You don't know how sinful you are. You don't know how incompetent you are, but scripture teaches us. It teaches us and it reproofs us. It convicts us and says, "You're going to move on to the stage of conscious incompetence. Oh Lord, I'm aware. I'm a sinner. Lord, I am incompetent at following you. I have failed at following you." I should say do think about "What sins am I struggling with and what stage of this process am I in? Where am I at?" and try and help yourself progress through this cycle of growth by dependence on the scripture and reliance on the community and the church and the Holy Spirit and prayer. Absolutely. But scripture is able to help us in this as well. And so in first service, I used an example that I think is just prevalent in our society, but also we never want to talk about it Lust. Lust is a sin. It is sinful to look at a man or a woman with lustful intentions in your heart. Maybe you don't recognize that that's a sin you are dealing with until you read the scriptures that say it is a sin. Or until maybe someone, a brother or sister in Christ points it out and it's like, "Hey man, hey sister, you have an inappropriate way of looking. You lust after these people." And it's like, "All right. I didn't realize it, but now I am consciously aware of my incompetence in this area." Well, now the next step is to get to conscious competence where it's you are aware that you are not doing it anymore. It's like, "All right, lust is the issue. I'm not going to look at that guy that way. I'm not going to look at that girl that way. I'm not going to look at anybody in any way other than that they are a child of God." And so when a beautiful human being walks by, you're just like, "Nope, nope, nope. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it." And the more you train yourself, the more that you are consciously competent and faithful in your resisting of the temptation, you move to unconscious competence. It's just natural. A beautiful person walks by, it's like, "Hello, brother or sister in Christ." There's no thoughts of impurity. There's no lust within your heart. It's just natural to do the right thing. This is the process for all sin and all temptation and that we need to grow to, is that we are faithful. We are faithful in following the Lord to the point that it just becomes second nature. This is what scripture talks about in the big fancy word of sanctification. That's what it is. That we are sanctified. We are becoming more like Christ to the point that we don't have to think about it anymore. It's just part of who we are. It's internalized. It's our nature. We are like Christ. So I just want to encourage us today, church, that this word, this book, the Bible, the scriptures is powerful. It is able to reveal the truth of the gospel for salvation to anyone who reads it. It is God's word to us to give us life. It will never be relevant, and it can change us. It could work in us to grow us, to sanctify us, make us more like Christ so we can be equipped to do the work that God has called us to do. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you. We praise you for this book. We thank you that you have chosen to speak so clearly to us, to guide us and provide life in it to us. Lord, soften our hearts to your words. Convict us of sin as we read it. Give us a heart and a mind that's willing to be dedicated to love your word more than anything else, to be able to seek after it daily and to let it change us, to sit in the uncomfortable tensions where we feel convicted and say, "Lord, change me. Change us." Lord, help us to love your word and proclaim it boldly and not be ashamed of it. We thank you. We praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Scripture

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 19, 2023 52:21


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com To get our minds set and our hearts set on what it means for Christians to be committed to scripture, I'm going to read a quote for us from John Wesley and I'll read it and then I'll make a couple comments on it. But John Wesley says this about scripture, "I want to know one thing, the way to heaven, how to land safe on that happy shore. God himself has condescended to teach the way; for this very end He came from heaven. He has written it down in a book. Oh, give me that book. At any price, give me the book of God. I have it. Here is knowledge enough for me. Let me be a man of one book." I love this quote. I'm going to add one thing to it. Amen and yes to all of this, but it's not just about how it'll land safe on that happy shore. It's also about how we are called to live while we wait for that day to come. Praise God that He has given us a book to instruct us about the way to heaven and eternity with him. Praise God that that same book tells us what to do while we wait. So with that, I just want us to be thinking and meditating upon what does it mean to be characterized as men or women of one book? That when we call ourselves Christians, we are truly committed to this book, the scriptures, the Bible, God's word, and that is a part of who we are. So with that, will you pray with me over the preaching of God's word? Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you so much that you have given us this book. You are word, your scriptures, the Bible. We thank you that you speak to us directly, plainly, clearly. We thank you that we have the privilege to be able to read this book whenever we desire. Lord, change our hearts. Encourage our hearts to love you more and specifically by loving your word more, by listening to your word, by submitting to your word, by committing to your word in our lives and trusting what you teach us in it more than ourselves. Lord, we thank you and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Alrighty. Today we will be spending the majority of our time in 2 Timothy chapter 3 verses four 14 through 17. We will be referencing a lot of scripture as we go into here. Really when I was preparing for this, all I wanted to do was open up the Bible on my computer, hit control A, copy paste, there's my sermon notes. We'd be here for a long time and that's culturally unacceptable. So I decided to narrow it down a little bit. But I bring this up to say that if any of the topics that we address today are interesting to you and you think, "Man, I want to know more, I want to learn more about it," there are a ton of scriptures that deal with the topics will address today. So I encourage you to study scripture, to go to scripture and study and see what it has to say about whatever the things are that we're talking about that you would like to know more about. So I also bring it up to say we're going to go through a lot. So hope you had your coffee, hope you're ready to go and let's dig into God's word. So starting in 2 Timothy chapter 3, verses 14 through 17, it says this, "But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed knowing from whom you've learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." This is the reading of God's holy, unerring, authoritative and fallible word. May He write these eternal truths upon our hearts. We're going to be spending our time in three points today. First point is that scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. Secondly, that scripture is breathed out by God. And thirdly, that scripture is able to equip you for every good work. So point number one, scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. I just read it, I'm going to read it again. This is verses 14 and 15 where it says, "But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you've learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus." So if you'll bear with me for a quick aside, something that really stood out to me in this text that I would like to address is that it says, "Timothy, you have been acquainted with the scriptures from a young age. And it has, you have been made known of Him." So okay, what's going on here? The first chapter of this book tells us that Timothy was taught the scriptures from his grandmother and his mother. If you're like me, the question is, "Well, what about his father?" Scripture tells us in the Book of Acts that his father was not a Christian and we don't have the whole story, but from what we know from beginning to end it, we believe that his father was never saved. By God's grace He may have and we pray that He was, but we have no idea. I bring this up to say a few things. First, to give a charge to parents and second to give a charge to kids. Parents, don't be afraid to make your kids acquainted with scripture. We live in a day and age where we like to say, "I'll let my kids figure it out for themselves. I'll let them decide. I don't want to bias them in anything." What we're going to talk about in the sermon, how scripture is life and it is life giving. So if you have something that gives life, why would you withhold that from your children? Think about it this way. If you said, "I bought food. I'm going to eat my food and I'll let my kids figure out how they're going to eat. They can ask me what I personally like to eat. They can ask me what I bought to eat and I'll tell them all about what I like to eat and why I eat it, and I'll tell them all that, but I'll let them figure it out for themselves." Child services would be called on you. That's not loving. It's not helpful to them. If we truly believe that scripture is life giving, we should want to raise our kids in it to know it. And now, kids and teenagers, let your parents teach you the scriptures, trust them. Trust that it is life and they are seeking your wellbeing and your good in it. So allow them to teach you and desire it for yourself. Seek after desire to know scripture yourself. The last thing I want to address in this little tangent of mine... Sermon's not over yet, sorry. But the last thing I want to address in this tangent is I want to address single mothers and women who are married and they are a Christian and their husband is not. I want to tell you, take encouragement from scripture. God is with you. God loves you and He cares for you and He has given you the ability to equip your child to follow the Lord, that when scripture tells us that fathers are called to lead their family spiritually about when they fail, whether from death, from disease, from abandonment, from not being around to begin with, mothers, you are still loved and cared for and equipped to raise your child and even more so the need for scripture is needed. So I just want to encourage you, mothers, rely on scripture. When life gets hard and it's hard to raise a kid, depend on scripture and depend on the church. But scripture is able to equip you in that as well. So there's my brief aside. Sorry about that. Point number one, scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. That's the text that we just read. It ends with saying it's able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. So point, first thing we got to figure out in here is the word able. It says that scripture is able to make you wise for salvation. It's not a guarantee, but it is powerful to do it. It doesn't mean that just because you read this book you're going to instantly know what it means to be saved, but it has the power to do it if you submit to it and trust it. The second thing that I want to point out is that it says it's able to make you wise for salvation. It's not going to save you in and of itself. You can't read this book and say, "Oh, I read this book, I'm good to go. I'm saved now." No, that's not how it works. But it is able to make us wise, to show us to open our eyes to the message of the gospel through faith in Christ Jesus, right? Christ Jesus is the one who saves. I could quote the entirety of scripture and show you how it points to this concept. I'm just going to read one in Acts chapter 4, verse 12, speaking of Jesus, it says this, "And there is salvation in no one else for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." What's scripture is all about, what it's all pointing to is Christ, and that He alone gives us salvation. Through His life, His death and resurrection on the cross, He has paid the penalty for our sins. And through our faith in him, we can be saved. No other name, no other religion, no other concept or ideology or thoughts or way of life can save us. Nothing but Christ alone. And so scripture is able to make us wise to that because it's what it talks about. That's what this whole book is about. And Jesus knew this. What I find so interesting about this idea is that Jesus used scripture in this way to make people wise for salvation. Well, what do I mean by that? So the gospel, very clearly, that Jesus Christ is fully God. He came to earth and died on the cross because of our sins that when we rebelled, we transgress, we reject God. We sinned against him and the penalty for that sin is death, eternity apart from God. And Jesus came to die and take that penalty for us so that through faith in him saying, "Jesus, you saved me from my sins. You lived a perfect life, died to pay that penalty and raised to prove that you are God. I trust in you because I need you to save me. I can't do it on my own." Jesus did that. He was raised from the dead. Fact. And then He comes across two of His disciples walking on a road to a maze and the disciples are sad and they're talking to one another. They're sad because Jesus just died. And Jesus sees them and talks to them and they don't recognize him. And Jesus goes to them, "What are you talking about? Why are you guys sad?" And they're like, "Don't you know anything that's going on in the world today. Aren't you up to date? This guy Jesus that we've all been following? He just died. What are we supposed to do with our lives? We've been following him. He's dead. What do we do?" Well, as Jesus is talking to them, what does He do? Does He go and say, "Hey guys, it's me. I'm live. You don't have to be sad anymore"? No, He doesn't. We see in Luke chapter 24 what Jesus says to them, in chapter 24, verse 25, "And He said to them, 'Oh, foolish ones and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into His glory?' And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, He interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself." What Jesus chooses to do is to say, "Let's read the scriptures together. We all agree that this is God's words. Let's read it and I'll show you how all of it points to Jesus Christ." So if you're here today and you're not a Christian, maybe you're here just seeking questions, have thoughts, we're glad you're here. Maybe you're here because you just have this feeling that you're supposed to be here, you want to be here, a friend invited you, we're glad that you're here. Thank you for coming. I want to challenge you. If you are seeking after God, read this book. Read this book. Ask God to reveal himself to you from this book. It's not going to save you. Reading this book isn't going to save you, but it is able to open our eyes. It is powerful enough to open our eyes to the reality of Christ as our savior and our need for him. So if you're not a Christian, that's my challenge. Read this book, start reading it and see what it says about Christ and salvation. Point number two, scripture is breathed out by God. This is from verse 16 in our text, the first part of it where it says, "All scripture is breathed out by God." So a couple things we need to clarify here. What is meant by all of scripture? This is one of the times where I love to point out Greek words and like, "This is what they mean." The Greek word for all means all. It's very plain is what it means. It's all of it. It's this whole book, the whole cannon of scripture. Now, I can stand up here and go through historical arguments, scientific arguments, scholarly arguments and things like that to show you why this is the scripture. This is the whole of it. But I'm not going to do that because I believe God's word is powerful enough on its own. And if you read this book, it'll prove it's scriptureness, it's divinity, it's holiness to you. So I'm not going to defend it in that way, but I will give you just like a little bit of information that that might be helpful. So first, when we say all scripture, we're talking about the Old and New Testament, so this book, the Bible. And if you have questions about the canonicity, the completeness of the Old Testament, I just want to encourage you that scholars and historians have never really questioned this. This is not really something that's ever been debated. It's been solidified for a very long time. If you want to know more about that, I encourage you to study it, to look it up. You can talk to me afterwards. But Josephus was a Jewish historian. He was not a Christian, but a Jewish historian at the time of Christ. This is what he says about the Old Testament canon of scriptures. He says, "For although such long ages have now passed, no one has ventured neither to add or to remove or to alter a syllable." What he was saying is for as long as we can study history, as long back as he was able to find, no one has dared change or add anything to the cannon of the Old Testament because everyone knew that this was the scriptures. It's the same scriptures that we have as our Old Testament today where most people have questions comes to the New Testament. I just want to tell you that the books of the New Testament were largely decided by three things. First, the divine qualities, the idea that they were written by God and speak of God truthfully. The reception by the churches, did people at the time when they were written actually believe that they were scripture? And third connection to an apostle, connection to someone who saw the life of Christ. So I'm just going to point out two places where the New Testament affirms its canonicity. In 1 Timothy chapter 5, verse 18, Paul writing a first letter to Timothy says this, "For the scripture says, 'You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages'." This is an idea that is from the Old Testament, but it's not a quote from the Old Testament. The idea is consolidated to this quote by Jesus in the books of Matthew and of Luke. So Paul writing this letter is affirming the gospels as scripture. He's saying we in the church at that time believe that the gospels are divine quality, are of equal value of scripture as the whole of the Old Testament. So the church in the early days accepted the gospels as scripture. Second one I want to point out is 2 Peter chapter 3 verses 15 and 16, where Peter says, "And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you, according to the wisdom given him as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction as they do the other scriptures." I'm pointing this one out because for some reason Paul is the one we have the most difficulty with in modern times, and it's not for some reason. It's the reason that it says here, he says hard things which we don't like, and so we twist them. But Peter makes a couple of points here. First, he points out that... Excuse me. Paul is writing from wisdom given to him. It's not his own wisdom, it's not his own thoughts. It's the wisdom of the Holy Spirit that has been given to him that Paul is writing these letters. Then he says, "Just like every other scripture, people are going to twist it." This is a statement confirming the canonicity, the authority, the scripture or nature of Paul's letters saying that, "Yeah, Paul's letters are scriptures. And just like all of the other scriptures, people naturally are going to try and twist them to fit their own desires." And so people like to say, "I believe in the canon of scripture minus Paul. Just get rid of Paul and I accept the rest of it." Well, if you accept the rest of it, you have to accept that Peter calls those letters of Paul scripture. And so you have to submit to them as scripture as well. I could go on and on forever about this. I'm not going to. If you have more thoughts or questions about the canonicity of scripture, I encourage you to study it and feel free to talk to us and people in your community groups about it. But, that's what we mean by all scripture. We're talking about this book. Every single part of it is breathed out by God. Well, what do we mean by breathed out by God? It means kind of three things, but first is that it's inspired by God. It originates from God himself. We see this idea in 2 Peter chapter 1 verses 20. Peter says this, "Knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." So Peter is telling us, "What is scripture? What are the things written in there?" Yes, men physically wrote them down, penned them, but they were speaking from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was guiding them, was directing their thoughts, their minds, their heart and saying, "This is what God wants you to tell people" and they just wrote it down. So when we talk about scripture as a breathed out by, we say it's holy, unerring, authoritative, divinely inspired is what we're getting at. We're saying that this is from God. It's not a message that men have to tell other people. It's a message that God has to tell us. The second thing that it means for scripture to be breathed out by God is that it is alive. In scripture when we see God breathing, it's not just because He's like out of breath huffing and puffing or anything like that. It's He's doing something with it. He's giving life. We see this most clearly in Genesis chapter 2, verse 7 when God creates man, creates Adam. It says, "Then the Lord God formed the man of the dust of the ground." Dust is not alive, dust is dead. "And breathe into His nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature." This word is alive. Do we know that scripture is alive? Well, what do we mean? I'm not saying it's going to jump out of my hand and start attacking or talking or doing. That's not what we're talking about. Well, Hebrews clarifies for us what does it mean for the word of God to be living. It says, "For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit of joints and of marrow and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart." Scripture is alive. It is living, meaning it's always relevant. It's never going to not apply. Why? Because it's sharper than any two-edged sword. It can pierce through culture. It could pierce through personality. It could pierce through ideologies and thoughts and mentalities and upbringings and get to the heart of all of the issues. It will always be relevant because it speaks upon what actually matters in life. This is something that people like to debate or throw out there. Not even debate. All the time it's like, "It's an old book. It's not really relevant anymore." My favorite thought on this is from Voltaire. I don't know how many of you are familiar with him, but he's a French theologian and a really smart, brilliant guy, loved the concept of a God existing so long as that God didn't tell him how to do anything or have any impact on his life. This is what Voltaire says about scripture. In 1776, he says, "100 years from my day," so 1876, "there will not be a Bible on earth except one that is looked upon by an antiquarian curiosity seeker." By 1876, Voltaire promise that a Bible's not going to exist except by the people who like weird old stuff. They'll have a Bible just for curiosity's sake. Well Voltaire, you're wrong. You're very wrong. I didn't mention this in first service, but he died a few years after this and his house was bought by the French Bible printing company and they used it to print even more Bible. So anyway, that's just God's humor in all of this. But why? Scripture. It seems so outdated. It doesn't speak to the things that culture likes. Cultures move past this. We've progressed. Why would it still exist? Because it's true and it speaks to our hearts. It speaks to us on a level that only God can pierce through everything going on in our lives and speak directly to us. This is what it means for scripture to be alive. The third thing that it means for scripture to be breathed out is that it gives life. It gives life. In Matthew chapter 4, Jesus says, "But He answered them, 'It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God'." We can do everything we're supposed to physically. We can eat right, we can exercise, drink water, stay hydrated, do everything that we can to prolong our life here on earth, and without God's word, we've never really lived. We can do everything to extend our life on earth, but apart from the salvation that comes from Christ that we are made wise to from the scriptures, the eternal life is one of death. Only through the power and the saving work of Christ can our eternal life breathe life. I was convicted in the middle of first service. So if you guys know, God's convicted my heart of sinfulness and reminded me how much I love bread. It says, "More man shall not live by bread alone." God reminded me in college before I cared about my health at all because I wasn't married yet, so I didn't affect anybody else. I would just buy a loaf of bread for dinner and just eat it with olive oil, garlic, Parmesan. Anyways, I'm hungry. Bread is so good. There is nothing better to eat than warm, fresh out of the oven, good bread. This is incredible stuff, guys. Praise God for bread. Amen. We need to love God's word more than that. Amen. I clarified in first service, as much as I loved bread, we need to love scripture more than that because maybe you don't feel the same. But the idea is that God's word will actually give life. It enables us to live a life of abundance here on earth, but also it leads us to a life of faithfully following the Lord an eternal blessing and reward for following him. And so if we actually believe God's word, the scriptures is breathed out by God, it is alive, it is from God, and it is able to give us life, we should really like this word, like to read it, like to study it, want to know it. This is what the early church exampled or lived like to show us. In the Book of Acts in chapter 2, a couple weeks ago we had a sermon on committed to a local church. We talked through the end of Acts after the Pentecost what did the local church look like. This text is 100% absolutely about needing to be committed to a local church, but I want to read it to us and I want you to focus on where does it talk about scripture in how the early church lived immediately after the Pentecost. In Acts chapter 2, starting in verse 42 it says, "And they, Christians, devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and the fellowship to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul. Many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. And day by day attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved." So yes, this text is about commitment to a local church and what the early church looked like, but it's bracketed by scripture. It starts off that the early church devoted themselves to the apostles teaching. They devoted themselves to the words and teachings of the apostles, what we have written down and recorded as of the New Testament. And then it ends in day by day attending temple together. Well, what happened at temple? Yes, there was community events and things like that, but primarily what happened is that people were reading aloud the words of the scriptures and we're teaching upon the scriptures. And day by day they went to hear it. This is how much the early church was committed to scripture that even though manuscripts and copies weren't widely known and available to people, they were willing to travel and go to hear it every day. Now, the city of Jerusalem, where they would go was broken into different sections for sort of the higher ups and the lower ups, most of the people in the church were just common men and women. The common men and women lived in the lower part of the city that was a half mile walk upstairs, up a mountain. They had stairs though. So upstairs to get to the temple to be able to hear the word of God preached. Now if you're here and you're like, "I live in Boston. I walk more than a half mile every day, that's no problem," good. Then why is it so hard for us to take two steps to find the Bible in our room, in our home, in our apartments, wherever it may be? Oh, just take the phone out of our pockets and be like, "Oh, there's the Bible app." Why is it so hard for us to read God's word? If we truly believe it is breath of God, it is life and God's words, we should want to hear it all the time as much as we can. We should not let the Bible app on our phone be the least used app on our phone and we shouldn't let the Bible be the book collecting dust on our shelves. We should want it, we should desire it, we should love it and seek after it. Point number three is that scripture is able to equip you for every good work. This is verses 16 and 17 in our text. This is where the big thrust of this text comes in and it says, "All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." First thing I want to address here is the phrase man of God. What is meant when Paul writes that the man of God may be complete? Well, the context of this book is that Paul is writing this letter to Timothy who is a pastor and a preacher in the church. And so he is writing to him specifically about how to lead and run a church. That's why we call these books a pastoral epistle, is what we call them. And so the idea is that pastors, preachers, people in ministry, missionaries, whoever is charged by God for the work of God, you need to be rooted in scripture. You need to let scripture work on you first before you are able to preach it to others. But it's more than that. It's more than that. The phrase man of God is actually an Old Testament phrase for any person that God sent with a message to deliver. If someone, a prophet was given a message, words by God and said, "Go tell this to someone," they were referred to as the man of God. So if you're sitting here and like, "Good. Wooh! This is for pastors and preachers and missionaries. Great," you're not excused either. None of us are. Because if you remember, a few weeks ago we talked about the Great Commission. Matthew chapter 28, verse 18 and 20, it says, "And Jesus came and said to them, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age'." We've talked about how this is a charge for every Christian. So if you're a Christian here today, you have a message from God, the gospel, that you are called and sent to go and proclaim. And so if you want to be equipped, if you want to be complete to do that work, your life needs to be rooted in scripture, needs to have scripture as its foundation because it is what equips us to do what God has told us and sent us to do. How does it do it? Paul gets into this sort of four phase step of how scripture equips us and it's by teaching, by reproof, correction, and training. So what does it meant by teaching? Well, teaching is essentially information-based. You can think of it that way, that it's scripture tells us, teaches us what God is like, who He is, what is righteous, what is good, what is sinful, what is bad. It gives us that information and we should know it. We should desire to know it. And then because we are sinful people, that information will reproof us. I don't know the last time you heard the word reproof in day-to-day conversation. I don't think I've ever heard it outside of a church. But the word is essentially convicting. We are convicted by it. It's literally the process of trying someone as guilty. It's like, "You're guilty. We're going to put you to the test to show that you're guilty." I think of the Salem witch trials if they were actually all guilty, and it's just like, "You're guilty. We're going to prove that you're guilty to everybody. Okay, you're guilty." Essentially, it is what it is. Scripture convicts us in that way. We are sinful. When we read God's word, it shows us, "Oh, God wants me to be like that? I'm not like that. I'm sinful. I've fallen short." And it should convict us. It should change our thoughts and ideas about how we live so that we want to live more like Christ. And so if reading scripture doesn't convict us, there could be a few things going on in our lives. First thing is maybe you haven't understood the weight of the gospel, right? The weight of the gospel is that our sin, the things that we have done wrong, transgressed God with, is what put Christ on the cross in the first place. It is the reason why Christ God needed to die. That should convict us when we think about the weight of our sins. But we are sinful people, so we aren't always convicted of our sin because we're not perfect. And so maybe we're not convicted of sin when we read scripture because we have what a psychiatrist and therapists call main character syndrome. Main character syndrome is the idea that when you watch a movie or read a book, you just naturally insert yourself in the place of the main character. That's why these things are written most of the time. We can't do that with scripture. You can't. We're not the main character of scripture. Jesus is. Jesus is the main character. Again, we already talked about how scripture is all about Jesus and His salvation to us. So it does apply to us. It is relevant to us, but it's not primarily about us. And so if we read scripture as a main character, we're like, "Wow, this Jesus guy is pretty good. It makes me feel good about myself. I must be pretty good too. All right, I guess I'm good." We can't do that with scripture. We have to let scripture convict us. The third reason why we might not be convicted when we read scripture of our sin is we have itching ears. "Itching ears. What does that mean? What's going on there?" This is what Paul tells Timothy to be warned, be careful of, in the next chapter of his letter. In this chapter, he is focusing on Timothy's need for scripture for his edification in and of himself. In the next chapter, he says, "You must then preach it. You need to preach scripture. It is the best thing for preaching.' And then in chapter 4, verse 2, he says this, "For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but will have itching ears. They will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths." Christians, we can't have itching ears. We can't say, "Ooh, scripture says that. I don't like that so I'm going to find someone who says something different and I'll listen to them." Or, "Ooh, this part of scripture says what I like and that part doesn't so I'm just going to not think about that part and I'll just focus on this part that I like." We can't have ears that we want to scratch with whatever we feel is right and we want to hear. We need to have ears that humbly come to scripture and say, "Ooh, I don't like that. Why? What's that convicting me of? What's it challenging me of? Why am I so disturbed by this text? It is the word of God, so what do I need to change?" Scripture is able to inform us about God and about righteousness and about life, but it is going to convict us then when we see our sinfulness and our fallenness. But we don't stay there. We don't stay there. So the next point is correction. Correction, I think, we all think of as a negative word. Like you're correctional facilities, that's bad. It sounds bad. Literally, it's to improve. It's to change. It's a good thing. It has a positive connotation. We can correct. We can change. When we see sin in our lives, we don't have to stay that way. I love this verse. 1 John chapter 1, verse 9 it says, "If we confess our sins, He, Jesus is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." So when we're studying scripture and we learn that we are sinful and we are convicted of sin in our hearts, what do we do? We go to Christ and we confess it to him knowing that he is faithful and just to forgive us. He will forgive us. We don't have to stay in it and don't have to stay in our guilt and shame. Then he also cleanses us. I love that. He cleanses us. So he removes it from us. We aren't that anymore. It's not who we are. We can change. We can grow. We can mature in our lives and in our faith. This process then will mature us. And that's the last thing that Paul talks about is training in righteousness. The word training is the idea of disciplined, but it's also of parenting. It's the same word that is used for parenting, for raising up in maturity. Scripture is profitable for raising us up in spiritual maturity. Well, how does it do this? Psalm one 19 verse 11, it says, "I have stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you." Joshua 1:8, "This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it." So as we are training, as we are preparing to grow in maturity of our faith, to grow in faithful obedience as we've been talking about in the Roman sermon series before this, we need to have God's word stored up in our hearts and not let it depart from our mouths. Why? It does both sides of the coin, that we might not sin against God. It helps us fight sin, and that we may be careful to do according to all that is written. That we can actively do what is right. Scripture has the power to discipline, to change us, to train us up in maturity and it has the ability to help us fight temptation and sin, right? The thing that prevents us from growing in maturity is when we fall back into sin, when we sin and we sin and we don't recognize, we don't repent, or we just keep falling back into sin. Scripture is there to help us in those moments, to fight off sin in the first place and to encourage us when we have failed. And Jesus knew this. Jesus' primary weapon against temptation was scripture. In the New Testament, Jesus is tempted by Satan. He is tempted. And the first time Jesus says, "No, for it is written." And then Satan's like, "Okay, I'll tempt to you a different way." And Jesus says, "No, for it is written." And a third time Satan tempts him and Jesus says, "Be gone, Satan! For it is written." This is where I get to talk about memorization of scripture. I don't really like that word. I'm sorry. If you are great at memorizing scripture, great. Praise God. That's awesome. I prefer the word internalize. We need to internalize scripture. It's good to memorize. Do. I encourage you. Do memorize scripture. Know it. That's great. But if someone's like, "Ph, what does this verse say?" and you're able to repeat it to them, that's awesome. And then if they ask you, "But what does it mean?" and you're like, "Oh, I don't know," that's not very helpful. And if they're like, "Well, how does that apply to your life?", you're like, "Ah, beats me," that's not helpful. That's not what scripture is talking about. We store it up in our hearts. We internalize it. We make it a part of who we are. We let it transform us so that way when temptations come, we can say "No, for is written." I think when I've heard that section of Jesus' temptation preached on most, it's often just memorize scripture. It's good. Good. Good to know the scripture. But do you have specific scriptures prepared to fight against specific temptations? We are all sinful people. Let's not pretend we're not. We are. We all have different struggles and different temptations. So whatever it is, whatever sin you are struggling with, you are dealing with, study scripture and what does scripture say about that. So that way the next time temptation comes, you're ready. I think when temptation comes, our primary response is to just ignore it and try and delay it. That never works. To muster up emotional strength within us like, "I'm going to fight against this. I'm just going to be tough and stand here and not moved." Or it's to just, "Oh, well, whatever. That's the worst." But do we do what Jesus did? Actively say scripture. Don't be afraid to say it out loud. You might sound weird for a little bit, but that's okay. But there's power in words. So when temptation comes say, "No, Satan! Be gone, Satan! For it is written." And have scripture ready. Know scripture. Be prepared with scripture to be able to fight against temptation. This scripture, as we study and as we meditate on it and internalize it, it will encourage us in this process because even still, we'll fall short. We'll fall to temptations, we will sin, but scripture will then still encourage us. And this is Romans chapter 15, verse 4, it says, "For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us so that through the endurance taught in scriptures and the encouragement they provide, we might have hope." One of the ways Satan likes to have power over us in that temptation is that when we fall, when we sin, he wants to lead us to despair, to lead us to guilt, to say, "Ah, I just stuck in it. I've messed up a lot," or, "I'm just here. I can't get out." It's when we need scripture. We need scripture to preach truth to us that there is endurance. We are able to endure. And there is encouragement within God's word to help us to have hope. Even when we fail, even when we fall short, no matter what is going on in our lives or what temptation we face, we can always have hope. When we're lacking that hope, we should go to scripture and study it and seek it and ask God, "Give us hope in these situations." Really this four stages of teaching, reproof, correction, and training, it perfectly exemplifies what I was taught as the cycle of growth. This cycle of growth was something that I was taught at a teen's conference of how do we do ministry to teenagers. And I was like, "This is silly. Everybody needs to hear this. This should just be everywhere, not just for teenagers." But it's called the cycle of growth because it's how we are called to grow. The first step of it is unconscious incompetence. You don't know how sinful you are. You don't know how incompetent you are, but scripture teaches us. It teaches us and it reproofs us. It convicts us and says, "You're going to move on to the stage of conscious incompetence. Oh Lord, I'm aware. I'm a sinner. Lord, I am incompetent at following you. I have failed at following you." I should say do think about "What sins am I struggling with and what stage of this process am I in? Where am I at?" and try and help yourself progress through this cycle of growth by dependence on the scripture and reliance on the community and the church and the Holy Spirit and prayer. Absolutely. But scripture is able to help us in this as well. And so in first service, I used an example that I think is just prevalent in our society, but also we never want to talk about it Lust. Lust is a sin. It is sinful to look at a man or a woman with lustful intentions in your heart. Maybe you don't recognize that that's a sin you are dealing with until you read the scriptures that say it is a sin. Or until maybe someone, a brother or sister in Christ points it out and it's like, "Hey man, hey sister, you have an inappropriate way of looking. You lust after these people." And it's like, "All right. I didn't realize it, but now I am consciously aware of my incompetence in this area." Well, now the next step is to get to conscious competence where it's you are aware that you are not doing it anymore. It's like, "All right, lust is the issue. I'm not going to look at that guy that way. I'm not going to look at that girl that way. I'm not going to look at anybody in any way other than that they are a child of God." And so when a beautiful human being walks by, you're just like, "Nope, nope, nope. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it." And the more you train yourself, the more that you are consciously competent and faithful in your resisting of the temptation, you move to unconscious competence. It's just natural. A beautiful person walks by, it's like, "Hello, brother or sister in Christ." There's no thoughts of impurity. There's no lust within your heart. It's just natural to do the right thing. This is the process for all sin and all temptation and that we need to grow to, is that we are faithful. We are faithful in following the Lord to the point that it just becomes second nature. This is what scripture talks about in the big fancy word of sanctification. That's what it is. That we are sanctified. We are becoming more like Christ to the point that we don't have to think about it anymore. It's just part of who we are. It's internalized. It's our nature. We are like Christ. So I just want to encourage us today, church, that this word, this book, the Bible, the scriptures is powerful. It is able to reveal the truth of the gospel for salvation to anyone who reads it. It is God's word to us to give us life. It will never be relevant, and it can change us. It could work in us to grow us, to sanctify us, make us more like Christ so we can be equipped to do the work that God has called us to do. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you. We praise you for this book. We thank you that you have chosen to speak so clearly to us, to guide us and provide life in it to us. Lord, soften our hearts to your words. Convict us of sin as we read it. Give us a heart and a mind that's willing to be dedicated to love your word more than anything else, to be able to seek after it daily and to let it change us, to sit in the uncomfortable tensions where we feel convicted and say, "Lord, change me. Change us." Lord, help us to love your word and proclaim it boldly and not be ashamed of it. We thank you. We praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Discipleship

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 12, 2023 49:18


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. This morning we are beginning... We are in week four of our sermon series Committed. We've been talking about the essential habits of an abundant life. And what I've been saying over these last four weeks is that we are looking at the essential, the non-negotiable and super practical commitments that every Christian needs to make in order to grow in their faith, in order to persevere through the trials of life, in order to fulfill God's calling for their life and to experience and enjoy the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give. And I'm probably going to repeat that every week. I've been told repetition is the mother of wisdom, but also every week we have new people here that are joining us for the first time and want to get them caught off the speed. And so as we begin, just a couple of reminders. First of all, as we talk about abundant life, said this in the first week of the series, we're not talking about a life full of the earthly comforts and pleasures that the world often seeks. We're talking about something deeper than that. We were talking about a life filled with purpose, meaning, with mission, with the hope, love, joy, peace, presence of God's Holy Spirit, of a life lived in the presence of Jesus Christ and so that's one reminder. Secondly, if you weren't here last week, we began looking specifically at something in scripture called the Great Commission. And you can find this in Matthew chapter 28 beginning in verse 18 said, and Jesus came and says to his disciples... This is right before he ascends into heaven. So he's been resurrected, he's risen, conquered the grave, he's about to return to his Father's right hand on his throne in heaven. He tells his disciples this, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. And so go therefore and make disciples of all of the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." This is the great commission. This is the mission of the church. This is the mission that every Christian is called to live out. And last week when we started this, we talked about how there's really two aspects of this mission. The first one we looked at last week was evangelism. It's the call to go and to make disciples of all the nations. And that for some of us, that means God's going to call us across the world. For most of us it means God's going to call us just across the street, across the cubicle, across the way to the people that he has put into our lives. But to go and to do so and to share this good news with them. And so we talked about evangelism last week. This week we are focusing on the second part. We're focusing on discipleship. We're focusing on Jesus' command to go and teach them to observe, all that I have commanded you to do. Discipleship to simply put is the lifelong process of following Jesus, of trusting his word, of obeying his commands, of becoming like him more and more in faith and knowledge and holiness and obedience to the Father. It's a total body soul transformation. Our minds are transformed by the truth of his word. He transforms the desires of our hearts, the actions of our hands. And last week when we started talking about this mission, we talked about how really when you look at it, the mission is very clear and the mission is very simple. The mission is simple, but simple doesn't mean easy. Evangelism's hard. And as we talk about discipleship today, what we're going to find is that discipleship is costly. That our salvation cost us nothing. It costs Jesus everything, our justification. But justification costs us nothing. We are saved by grace through faith. It is the free gift of God. Salvation is free. But our sanctification, this life of discipleship that we are called to, that may cost us everything. We sing the song often. Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe. And so we're going to be talking about this today and we're going to see that discipleship is costly, but it doesn't need to be complicated. And so I'm going to be trying to demystify discipleship for us today so that together we can be the disciples that Jesus calls us to be. And so if you have your Bibles, open up to Matthew chapter four, we're going to be looking at verse 18 through 22. A pretty short passage, just a couple of verses. And really we're going to be focusing most of our time just on one verse within this passage, just one sentence, 10 words. But in these 10 words Jesus gives us, he lays out the entire framework for what it means to be one of his disciples. So if you have your Bibles, you can follow along. If not the words will be up here on the screen. This is Matthew chapter four, beginning in verse 17. Sorry, I said 18 earlier. Matthew 4:17. Matthew tells us, "From that time Jesus began to preach saying, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And while walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who's called Peter, and Andrew his brother, and they were casting the net into the sea for they were fishermen. And he said to them, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. And immediately they left their nets and they followed him. And going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets and he called to them and immediately they left the boat and their father and they followed him." This is the reading of God's holy word with us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer over our message today? Jesus, I pray today that you would make evident both the price and the privilege of being your disciple. Help us to count the cost so that we can find Christ worthy. Lord, challenge us today where we need to be challenged. Holy Spirit, convict us where we need to be convicted. Encourage us in whatever area that we may lack the faith or the courage to move forward, to commit, to take up our cross and to follow Jesus. Lord, I pray that you would bless our time and your word right now. I ask this in Jesus name. Amen. All right, well I said that we're going to be looking primarily at just one verse out of this passage and the verse we're going to be looking at it's right there in the middle. It's Matthew chapter four verse 19. And it just simply says this, "And he said to them, follow me and I will make you fishers of men." And in that one short sentence, Jesus gives us the entire framework of what it means to be his disciple. Follow him and he will make you a fisher of men. And so we're going to break this down thought for thought. And the first thing Jesus says is follow me. And the first thing that we need to understand is that being a disciple of Jesus requires a change of both direction and of identity. And when Jesus tells us to follow him, this is what he's calling us to do. It's a change of direction and identity. Right before calling Peter and Andrew, Matthew tells us that from that time Jesus began to preach, and this was his message. His message was, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." And we talked about this in the first week, that discipleship, following Jesus begins with repentance and faith. That you cannot follow Jesus and yet continue to live life your own way. That there needs to be a change in the trajectory of your life where you turn away from sin in repentance and you turn toward Jesus Christ in faith. You got to lay down your pride. You got to lay down your sin. You got to lay down the false idols and the ideologies of this world and submit fully to the lordship of Jesus Christ as your king. It's a change in direction, but it is also a change in identity. Discipleship, it's not just something that you do. It is something that you become. It is something that you are. That you were once a prisoner in the domain of darkness, you have now been transferred as a citizen into the kingdom of heaven. You were a slave to sin, but you have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. You've been set free. You've been adopted into the household of God. You are now a child of God. You are now a new creation in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. A radical transformation of identity takes place when you become a disciple of Jesus Christ. I'm going to read one of Jesus' most famous teachings that he gave his disciples about what it means to follow him. And if you never heard this, if you've never read this before, this is shocking. Matthew 16 verse 24. Jesus told his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, if anyone wants to follow me and be my disciple, then let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." We talk so much about the cross. Sometimes you forget what that really is. This is the most gruesome form of execution and punishment and existence in that world. Jesus saying, this is what it looks like to follow me. You're going to have to die to yourself. You're going to have to pick up your cross. You're never going to find true life. You're never going to find your true self, your true identity until you lose it, till you lay down your old life. That to be born again as a child of God, you need to die to yourself. That to be accepted as a disciple of Jesus, you need to deny yourself, deny your selfish, proud, rebellious heart and surrender your life to Jesus Christ. And what we see is that Jesus offers us this glorious new identity, but with it comes a radical change in direction, one that is going to require total surrender. And so Jesus calls these first disciples and immediately they leave everything. They leave their nets, they leave their boats, their livelihoods, their family. They leave it all to follow Jesus. And before we go any further today, this is what we need to ask ourself. This is what I want you to ask yourself. What have you given up for the gospel? What have you needed to leave behind to follow Jesus? Or what do you know that you're being called to leave behind, to let go of right now? Are there things that you know should be giving up, that you need to be letting go of, leaving behind, surrendering in order to fully follow Jesus as you know that you ought? Peter and Andrew, James and John, they left everything. Now this doesn't mean that every Christian needs to leave their job and leave their family and go be a missionary somewhere across the world, but not all of us are going to be called to that, but we are going to all be called to something. So what is the Holy Spirit putting on your heart right now? Is there something there that you're holding on to? Is something there that's holding you back from following Jesus as you ought? The only way to come to Christ is with the empty hands of faith, right? It's hard to embrace God when you got your arms already wrapped around the world, when your hands are full, when you're clinging to things that you know need to let go of.Hebrews 12:1 says, "Since we're surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin in which clings so closely." Just whatever is holding you, whatever you're tangled up and cast it aside, let it go. And then in your freedom in Christ, "Run with endurance the race that is set before us." How? "By looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him." He went that distance for us. "Seeing the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God." In Luke 14, Jesus is going about, he's preaching and large crowds of people begin to follow him. And in verse 27, he turns to these crowds and he says, "Listen, whoever doesn't bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you desiring to build a tower does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?" "Otherwise, when he has laid the foundation and is not able to finish it, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, this man began to build and was not able to finish. Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with 10,000 men to come against him with 20,000?" "And if not, while the other is he had a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace." So therefore, and this is his point, "So therefore any one of you who does not renounce all that he has, cannot be my disciple." What is it going to cost to follow a man who carried a cross? Jesus wasn't interested in drawing crowds, fair-weather fans, right? He wasn't coming so that he could clean up our lives a little bit or do some renovations here and there. He wants to come into your life. He wants to tear the whole house down. He wants to lay a new foundation, one that's going to last, one that he can build your life on for eternity. He wasn't looking for fair-weather fans, he's looking for people ready to deny themselves, ready to take up their cross, ready to follow him and lay their lives at his feet and say, Lord, not my will but yours be done. This is what it means to follow Jesus. We can't talk about discipleship without counting the cost. What is it going to cost? Are you willing to pay that price? I'm going to leave us here in this tension for a while. We'll come back at the end. I'll give you some resolution to this, but we're going to move on for now. And just understand that when Jesus says, follow me, he means take up your cross and follow me. But second, he says, follow me and I will make you. That if you follow Jesus, he's going to change your life. He's going to transform you. And the second point today we're going to be looking at is that being a disciple, it also requires a change of heart and behavior. To really grasp this, what Jesus is saying here and what's going on, you got to understand a little bit about first century Judaism because this idea of discipleship, it's maybe a word that we're familiar with, but it's not a word that's like commonly used or understood in our culture. It was very common in their culture back then. Everyone knew what a disciple was. They'd received disciples out and about following their rabbis around town. A disciple was a student who would come under the teaching and the instruction and the discipline of a rabbi, but they weren't just a student. See, first century Jewish kids, from an early age, they would begin the work of memorizing the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament. And as these children grew up, there would come a time where the very best, the very brightest students might perhaps be offered the rare and distinguished honor of being called by a rabbi to be his disciple. And accepting this invitation it meant you had to leave everything. You had to leave your old life, you had to leave your family, the family business. They would leave everything not to follow their rabbi, not just to learn from the rabbi, but to live with the rabbi, to spend every moment with the rabbi trying to learn all that they could to become like their rabbi in every way being a disciple. What it meant was living life in the presence of your rabbi, close proximity, close relationship. And the goal was so that you could really in every way become just like them. And this is exactly what we see Jesus did with his 12 disciples. They follow him around. Everywhere he went, they watched how he lived, they heard him talk, they served with him, they went on missions together with him, and they were learning to be like him in every way. And so we have to ask, what are the implications of this for us today? And really to be a disciple today, it doesn't mean anything different than what it meant for the disciples back then. The difference is Jesus isn't here with us physically. We don't follow him around, the man Jesus Christ in a physical body, but he pours his spirit out upon his church so that yeah, spiritually we live our life in the presence of our rabbi Jesus Christ with him, going where he goes, doing what he says. And I say that because Christians today, we often want to reduce discipleship to like a program or a class or a one-on-one mentorship with a more mature believer. And none of those things are bad. They're just not what we're talking about. There are just such a long ways off from what the New Testament is talking about when it uses this word disciple. And so being a disciple of Jesus, it means living like the 12. It means living in fellowship with other disciples. But you're not following them, you're following Jesus, you're following him together. And so we can't reduce this to meeting with a mentor. We can't reduce it to going and attending a seminar or a Sunday school class or anything like that. When we're talking about the discipleship we're talking about living in community and fellowship with other disciples who are together following Jesus, living life in his presence by the power of his Holy Spirit. Following Jesus, abiding in Jesus, abiding in his spirit, abiding in his word together. And so what this means is two things. First of all, it means that disciples need to follow Jesus personally. And secondly, it means that disciples cannot follow Jesus privately. Personally, if you're a member of Mosaic or if you've taken our membership class, you know that one of the things we talk about in that class is that we have seven expectations of members here at Mosaic. And the first expectation that we have for our members is that each and every one of us strive spiritually. That we each take a personal responsibility for living life in the presence of Christ, of striving to build that relationship with Christ ourselves, of working out our own salvation with fear and trembling. This comes from Philippians chapter two verse 12. Paul says, "Therefore, my beloved, as you've always obeyed, so now not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure." You work out your own salvation personally because God is working in you personally. But bigger than that, the idea that Paul's really getting at here is that he wants this church to know and to understand and to never forget that he is not their pope, he's not their priest, he's not their rabbi. Jesus is. And this is important, the Philippians were not called to be disciples of Paul. They weren't called to follow Paul, they weren't called to live their lives in the presence of Paul. They were called to follow Jesus. And thankfully they were a church that really didn't struggle with this very much. They were a relatively healthy and mature and solid church. There was another church that Paul cared about that did struggle with this quite a bit. It was the church in Corinth. We did a whole sermon series on first and second Corinthians called Prodigal Church. And the reason we called it that is because this was a church that had some issues. They struggled with a lot of things and this was one of them. And so in first Corinthians chapter one, one of the very first things that Paul addresses with them is this. He says, "I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you all agree and that there be no division among you, but that you all be united in the same mind and the same judgment for it has been reported to me by Chloe's people that there's quarreling among you brothers." And this is what I mean. "What I mean is that each one of you says, well, I follow Paul or I follow Apollos or I follow Cephas, that's Peter, or I follow Christ." He says, "Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul?" Corinthian Church was pretty immature and dysfunctional at times and you read the letter that Paul wrote to them. He gives them a lot of correction. The Philippian church, however, was relatively strong and healthy. He addresses this same thing with them, but does so from way of encouragement and reminder. And so when you read the book of Philippians, one of the things you got to keep in mind, and you see this throughout the book, if you're reading it closely, one of the things you see is that Paul is writing to them from a place in his life where he doesn't know that he is much longer to live, right? This could be his last correspondence with them. He may never see them again. There's a very real chance that he may be facing death, even execution sometime in the near future. And he's not sure, but he wants to write to them to remind them that they're going to be fine without him. Because from the very beginning, they were not his church. God used him in a very special way as an apostle to help this church get started. But what they really needed to understand was that they were not Paul's church. They were Jesus' church. Paul wasn't their pope. Paul wasn't their priest, their mediator or their rabbi. The word that Paul uses to describe his relationship with them. He says, "I was your partner." We were partners in the gospel. We were disciples following Jesus together. And this is why he opens his letter in Philippians chapter one. He says, "I thank my God and all of my remembrance for you, always in all my prayers of mine for you, all making my prayers with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Christ Jesus." Well, who is the he that Paul is referring to here, right? Because Paul is the one who kind of planted this church, but Paul's not referring to himself. The he who began the good work that Paul is talking about is Jesus Christ. That Jesus will complete this good work even if Paul's no longer around. And this is how he starts his letter and then he encourages them with the same thing again at the end. Like, okay Paul, if you go, if you leave us, if you die, who's going to take care of us as a church? And he tells them in Philippians 4:19. He says, "My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in Christ Jesus." Regardless of whether Paul lived or died, what mattered was that Christ would be with them till the end of the age. And that Paul had full confidence that he would make sure even in Paul's absence, that Jesus would finish the good work that he had started in this church. And I say all this because this is what making disciples is all about. It's about teaching people to become independently dependent on Jesus. To become independent in the sense that they're not dependent on us or any other human being for their spiritual wellbeing and to become dependent on Jesus Christ who really is the head of the church, the chief shepherd of every church. And so this might be a paradigm shift for a lot of Christians. It was for the early church as well because this is not how the religious leaders of their day behave. The religious leaders of their day, they very much gathered people around themselves who were dependent on them, who looked to them as spiritual authorities, as mediators between them and God. But Jesus warned his disciples not to be like them, that as his followers that they were going to need to be different, that they could not go on and fall into the same footsteps of the other religious leaders of their day. And Jesus actually had very harsh words for some of these religious leaders. In Matthew chapter 23, he's warning his disciples about this and in verse five he says, "First of all, they do all of their deeds to be seen by others. They love to make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long." They like to show off their spiritual maturity. "And they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces, and they love being called rabbi by others, but you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher and you are all brothers. And call no man your father on earth for you of one Father who is in heaven. Neither be called instructor for you have one instructor, the Christ." He says, "The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, but whoever humbles himself will be exalted." Now, I don't think Jesus is trying to argue about semantics and titles and calling people teacher or whatever that may be, but he's trying to make a point and the point is this, there's only one Father and by the blood of Jesus Christ, God can be your Father, but God can't be your grandfather. You can't be dependent on some other earthly father to be the mediator between you and God the Father. Only Jesus Christ can do that. There is one teacher, one rabbi, and Jesus can be your rabbi, but he can't be your rabbi's rabbi. He can't be your pastor's pastor. You need that relationship with him yourself. Jesus can call you friend, but he can't be a friend of a friend. The big idea is every single Christian needs to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ for themselves. As Paul said in first Timothy 2:5 that, "There is one God and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself as a ransom for all." This mission to go and to make disciples is not a mission to go and make disciples of ourselves. It's a mission to go and make disciples of Jesus. It's not a mission to go out and to become the mediator between God and men. The mission is to point people to the only mediator that there is, the man Jesus Christ. If I had to sum it all up, I would put it like this, that the call of discipleship... Well, first of all, it's a call to be a disciple, to be yourself connected to Christ, abiding in Christ, living in the presence of Christ, following your rabbi. But the call to make disciples is a call for those who are doing that, for those who are more mature in the faith, to help those who are less mature in the faith, become more mature in the faith, by becoming less dependent on them and more dependent on Jesus. That was a lot. So I'm going to say it again. That the call to make disciples is a call for those who are more mature in the faith to help those who are less mature in the faith, become more mature in the faith by becoming less dependent on them and more dependent on Jesus Christ, where you're teaching them to cling to Christ, to abide in Christ, to pursue Christ, to follow Jesus, and to live their lives in his presence. Yesterday our daughter Nora had a birthday party. She's turning eight tomorrow and with our kids we don't do the big huge birthday party every year. But we told them both, when you turn eight years old, you can do the big party where you invite the whole class and everything. So we did the whole trampoline park thing and celebrated her birthday and it was a ton of fun. Now every parent in the room knows when these birthdays come along its bittersweet because it's like how do they grow up so fast? I remember just as clear as it was yesterday, the day that she was born and now she's eight years old and it's hard to see them grow up. You just kind of want them to stay little forever. My wife saw one of these sappy parenting memes the other day, said something like, one day you're going to pick your child up and not realize it will be the last time you put them back down. First of all, how dare you? Like the internet is supposed to be a nice happy place, I thought. You say that and all the moms... It was more pronounced in the first service because we had all the MiniMo parents here. All the moms are like crying. All the dads coincidentally have something stuck in their eye and it's like, what? You just want them to stay little and cute forever, just hold on. They're so sweet and innocent. And we as parents, we think that way. God doesn't think that way. God doesn't want his kids to stay little for... He wants them to grow up fast, to grow up healthy and strong and mature. He wants them to grow up to be independent in the sense that they're not dependent on people or things, but dependent on himself. Because unlike us, unlike our kids, when God's kids grow up, they don't grow up by becoming less dependent on him as they mature. As God's children's mature, they mature in doing so, they begin to see how really totally and utterly dependent on God they really are. They become less dependent on people, on things, and they become more dependent on God himself. That's what it means to grow up, to mature in the faith, to live every moment with this awareness and dependency on your heavenly Father. And so what this means is like, yeah, a newborn baby Christian, they might need to be held, they might need to be fed for a while as they start to grow, they might need someone there to hold their hand as they learn how to walk. For a little while that's okay, but that's not the goal. The goal is not to coddle them, not to become the spiritual equivalent of helicopter parents. The goal is to help them grow up, push them out of the nest, teach them to feed themselves, teach them to walk on their own so that they can begin helping others to do the same. And John 15:5, Jesus said, "I'm the vine, you're the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing." That the only way for a disciple to be healthy, to grow and to bear fruit is not to be a branch of a branch of a branch. It's to be a branch directly connected and abiding in the vine of Jesus Christ. And so disciples need to follow Jesus personally, but disciples can't follow Jesus privately. That you need to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ but this doesn't mean that you should have a private relationship with Jesus Christ. I said this last week, I'm going to say it again. You almost never see Jesus in the gospels. You never any of the apostles. You almost never see them in a private one-on-one setting with anyone, like everything that Jesus did, he did in a communal setting. And Jesus knew each one of his disciples personally. He called each one of his disciples personally. He loved and he cared for each one of his disciples personally. But he spent almost all of his time with each one of his disciples in community, with the three, with the 12, with the 72. There's always a group of people around him, and I say this because sometimes we want to kind of narrowly define discipleship as like a one-on-one mentorship and that can be useful for a time, for a task, for a purpose. But when you read the New Testament, everything that you see happening is happening in the context of community. It's the body of Christ united working together. That's where people grow. And I said this earlier, I want to demystify discipleship. Discipleship is costly, but it shouldn't be complicated. And when you look at the example of Jesus, when you look at the example of the early church, what you find is there's really only four things that you need as a disciple of Jesus to grow in your faith. It's four things. You need the truth of God's word. You need the power, the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life. You need the fellowship of the church. And you need the experiences of life. You need God's word to cut to your heart, to reveal truth, to correct your understanding, to give you knowledge. You need God's Holy Spirit to bring conviction of sin, to bring assurance of your salvation. The Holy Spirit is needed. The Holy Spirit equips the members of the body so that they can minister with their gifts to one another. You need the word, you need the spirit. You need the fellowship of the church. You need the rest of the body holding you up and holding you accountable. And then you need the experience of life. And this is everyone, regardless of whether you're a disciple of Jesus or not, you're going to get the experiences of life. We're all going to go through the storms of life. How you go through those are dependent on those first three things. You go through the storms of life alone, they're going to crush you. Go through the storms of life with the power of God's Spirit and the fellowship with the church and the truth of his word. God's going to use those very experiences to grow your faith, your character, your perseverance to strengthen you. And so if you're living in the presence of Jesus, if you are in fellowship with other spirit-filled believers and together submitting your lives to the truth and to the authority of God's word, you are going to grow in your faith. It's not complicated. It takes commitment, it takes time. It takes patience and perseverance, but you will grow. And this is why if you know us as a church, we don't focus a lot of time in just offering a thousand different classes or seminars or programs. We focus so much time and care and attention into our community groups because this is where growth happens. Every week spirit-filled people coming together as the body of Christ around the truth of God's word. We're there together in community and that is where the Holy Spirit works in us and through us, to strengthen us, to guide us, to help us, to abide each firmly connected to the vine of Jesus Christ so that we can bear fruit as we go through the experiences of life together, the ups, the downs, the joys, the pains, all of it. God has ordained for our growth. There's a really beautiful picture of this in Ephesians chapter four that kind of shows how this all is intended to work. Ephesians 4:1. "I therefore, a prisoner of the Lord urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace. There's one body and one Spirit just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call. One Lord, one faith, one baptism when God and Father of all who is overall and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gifts." So first of all, Paul begins to show this picture of the unity of the body and of the power of the Father's Holy Spirit present in each member of the body. But then he says, within the unity of the body there is distinction among the members. That God equips the body, different people, members of the body in different ways and that they all need to work together to grow up together into maturity. And so he continues in verse 11, he says, "This is why he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, for building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes, rather speaking the truth in love. We are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ. From whom the whole body joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love." When Jesus says, I will make you, when Jesus tells us he's going to change our lives, this is how he does it as one body with many members, each equipped by the Holy Spirit to come and to work together under the headship of Jesus Christ, growing in unity, growing as one. And the idea here is if you abide in this, you will grow. That Jesus will make you new. He will bear his fruit in your life. He will give you and transform your heart, your behavior, your character. You will be conformed to the fullness, the image of Christ. So that's point number two. Point number three, being a disciple requires a change of heart and behavior. It also requires a change of purpose and perspective. And so I said I was going to leave you in that tension. We counting the cost of discipleship, going to kind of come back to that. Now, from our perspective in this life, when you look at the cost of following Jesus, right? Deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow him. That's a high price. That seems like that cost might be too much. It is high, and Jesus calls us to consider that cost before following him. He calls us to consider that cost. Then he challenges us to consider it again and to consider it from an eternal perspective. Because if you keep going in Matthew 16, the verse we read earlier, Jesus told the disciples, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." He tells them that, but then he gives them like... Well, let's look at this from a different angle. Let's look at this from an eternal perspective. Four verse 25. "Whoever would save his life will lose it, whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? What should a man give in return for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels and the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done." What Jesus wants to see is on the one hand the discipleship is costly and on the other hand, it's not nearly as costly as the alternative. What is it profit a man if he gains the whole world, all the money, all the fame, all the friends and praise and power and comforts of this world and yet loses his soul? What shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Whatever following Jesus may cost you right now and the grand scope of eternity, it is a small price to pay. That Jesus says, "I'm coming, and when I do, I'm coming in the glory of my Father and I'm going to repay each person according to what they've done." And every single one of us, we need to have this perspective. We need to see things from this angle, when we do, what we see is that the true cost of discipleship, it's not a price to be paid, it is an investment to be made. You invest your life savings, you give everything that you have, you give it all to Christ and you live life through the bear market of this life, but you do so knowing that in the end that the bulls are going to win, that the investment is going to pay off. That Jesus is coming soon and that your sacrifice, everything that you give up right now, it is earning you spiritual dividends right now and it's earning you heavenly rewards when Christ returns. Mark 10. Peter comes up to Jesus and he's like, look, "Jesus, we left everything to follow you." And Jesus says in verse 29, he says, "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brother or sister or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time. Houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and land with persecutions and in the age to come eternal life." In Matthew chapter 13, Jesus shares a few parables and to show us what this is like. He says in verse 44, "That the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure that's hidden in a field which a man found and he covered up. And then in his joy, he goes and he sells all that he has and buys that field." And the idea is from one perspective, this guy seems like a fool, right? He just gave his life savings to buy a worthless piece of dirt, an empty field. And yet from another perspective, you see that he didn't give up anything at all. That whatever he laid down to purchase that field could not compare to the infinite glory of riches that were buried beneath the surface that no one else could see. Jesus says again in verse 45, "That the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who on finding one pearl of great value." He goes out and he sells all that he has to buy it. And Jesus gives us this new perspective to think about discipleship and with this perspective, he gives us new purpose as well. That he says, "Follow me and I'm going to make you." And what is he going to make us? Ultimately he says, he's going to make you fishers of men. That's the purpose. Think about that purpose in the context of this new perspective that we have. Jesus asks, "What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and yet loses his soul?" Well flip that around. What does it profit a man if he gives up everything he has right now for the sake of the gospel, in order to gain the souls of others for eternity? Jesus wants to make us fishers of men. You think about that. Jesus wants to give you the opportunity right now as his disciple to play a part in altering the eternal destiny of souls, to play a part in changing the eternal destination of people. You talk about heavenly rewards, like imagine seeing someone in heaven and knowing that Jesus used your witness, your faithfulness, your sacrifice to get them there. Imagine the joy of walking in and seeing that person and knowing that they will be spending eternity in paradise, in the presence of Christ, and that you got to play a part in that. Before telling the parable of the prodigal son, Jesus told two other parables to the same effect in Luke chapter 15. In the context we're told that, "Tax collectors and sinners were drawing near to him and the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling about it, saying, "This man receives sinners and he eats with them." And so he told them this parable. He says, "What man of you having a hundred sheep if he has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open country and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he is found it, he lays it on his shoulder rejoicing and when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying, rejoice with me for I found my sheep that was lost. Just so I tell you, there's more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance." "Or what woman having 10 silver coins if she loses one does not light a lamp and sweep the house and see diligently until she finds it. And when she's found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors saying, rejoice with me for I found the coin that I lost. Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents." Who are we that we should be given the privilege, the joy of taking part in something like this? There is great joy we're told in heaven right now when one sinner repents, imagine the joy then. Imagine the joy when all the saints go marching into the joy of their master together and you see those souls that led you to Christ, and you see those people that Jesus used you in their life to lead them to Christ, to help them to grow in Christ. Imagine that joy of being there together. We do not deserve such an honor, and yet we serve a God of amazing grace. When you have this perspective and this purpose, it changes everything. And when you have this perspective and this purpose, all of a sudden everything seems, as Paul said in second Corinthians, it's like "Light and momentary affliction which is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison." For why? Because, "We are not looking to things that are seen, but the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal." Well, I could spend a whole lot more time talking about this theoretically, rather, what I would like you to do is I would like you to go into your community groups this week and talk about how you've experienced this for yourself personally. Share testimonies of God's grace. Jesus calls us fishermen and fishermen love to tell stories. And so tell some of those stories. I think we're going to be spending a lot of time in heaven telling fishermen stories of how Jesus used us to bring other people to faith or used other people to save us or lead us to himself. Share some of those stories this week. If you've played a part in leading someone else to Christ or share the stories of those who played a part in leading you to Christ, not to boast in yourself but to boast as Paul says in Jesus Christ, and to be an encouragement to one another. Share some of those stories this week. And if you're not connected to a community group, this is a really good week to get connected to a community group. If you don't take anything else away from the sermon, this is what I would hope you would take, that you need to be connected to a community, to have fellowship with other people in a meaningful way. And so we would love to help you do that. You can check those out on our website, or better yet, just stop by the welcome center out there and there's people there that would love to help you find a group that works for you. And then if you're here today and you are not yet connected to Christ, if you are ready to make that commitment, to become a follower of Christ, to become a disciple of Jesus Christ, we would love to talk to you about that as well. You can talk to people at the welcome center or Pastor Andy and I will be up here after the service. We'd love to talk to you about that. We could talk to you about baptism or just if you have any questions about Christianity in general, we'd be happy to talk to you, pray with you about that as well. Well, right now, let's pray and we'll spend more time worshiping together. Jesus, we thank you. We praise you so much for the price that you paid to save us. And I pray that you would give us now the grace and the strength and the courage to gladly pay, to gladly suffer and sacrifice whatever is needed to be your witnesses, your followers, your disciples here on earth right now. God help us to take up our crosses daily to follow you, knowing that as our good shepherd that you have promised to lead us into pastures of abundant life. Give us faith to believe that whatever we may have to give up right now in terms of worldly comforts and pleasure, they cannot compare to the spiritual blessings, the eternal rewards that await those who follow you. So Lord, help us to keep our eyes fixed, not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. Help us to keep our eyes fixed on you, Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that was set before you endured the cross for us, and you're now seated in glory and power at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. Father, we love you, we praise you, and now we just want to worship you together in the name of your son, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit to Discipleship

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 12, 2023 49:18


Audio Transcript: This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston ordonate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. This morning we are beginning... We are in week four of our sermon series Committed. We've been talking about the essential habits of an abundant life. And what I've been saying over these last four weeks is that we are looking at the essential, the non-negotiable and super practical commitments that every Christian needs to make in order to grow in their faith, in order to persevere through the trials of life, in order to fulfill God's calling for their life and to experience and enjoy the abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give. And I'm probably going to repeat that every week. I've been told repetition is the mother of wisdom, but also every week we have new people here that are joining us for the first time and want to get them caught off the speed. And so as we begin, just a couple of reminders. First of all, as we talk about abundant life, said this in the first week of the series, we're not talking about a life full of the earthly comforts and pleasures that the world often seeks. We're talking about something deeper than that. We were talking about a life filled with purpose, meaning, with mission, with the hope, love, joy, peace, presence of God's Holy Spirit, of a life lived in the presence of Jesus Christ and so that's one reminder. Secondly, if you weren't here last week, we began looking specifically at something in scripture called the Great Commission. And you can find this in Matthew chapter 28 beginning in verse 18 said, and Jesus came and says to his disciples... This is right before he ascends into heaven. So he's been resurrected, he's risen, conquered the grave, he's about to return to his Father's right hand on his throne in heaven. He tells his disciples this, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. And so go therefore and make disciples of all of the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." This is the great commission. This is the mission of the church. This is the mission that every Christian is called to live out. And last week when we started this, we talked about how there's really two aspects of this mission. The first one we looked at last week was evangelism. It's the call to go and to make disciples of all the nations. And that for some of us, that means God's going to call us across the world. For most of us it means God's going to call us just across the street, across the cubicle, across the way to the people that he has put into our lives. But to go and to do so and to share this good news with them. And so we talked about evangelism last week. This week we are focusing on the second part. We're focusing on discipleship. We're focusing on Jesus' command to go and teach them to observe, all that I have commanded you to do. Discipleship to simply put is the lifelong process of following Jesus, of trusting his word, of obeying his commands, of becoming like him more and more in faith and knowledge and holiness and obedience to the Father. It's a total body soul transformation. Our minds are transformed by the truth of his word. He transforms the desires of our hearts, the actions of our hands. And last week when we started talking about this mission, we talked about how really when you look at it, the mission is very clear and the mission is very simple. The mission is simple, but simple doesn't mean easy. Evangelism's hard. And as we talk about discipleship today, what we're going to find is that discipleship is costly. That our salvation cost us nothing. It costs Jesus everything, our justification. But justification costs us nothing. We are saved by grace through faith. It is the free gift of God. Salvation is free. But our sanctification, this life of discipleship that we are called to, that may cost us everything. We sing the song often. Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe. And so we're going to be talking about this today and we're going to see that discipleship is costly, but it doesn't need to be complicated. And so I'm going to be trying to demystify discipleship for us today so that together we can be the disciples that Jesus calls us to be. And so if you have your Bibles, open up to Matthew chapter four, we're going to be looking at verse 18 through 22. A pretty short passage, just a couple of verses. And really we're going to be focusing most of our time just on one verse within this passage, just one sentence, 10 words. But in these 10 words Jesus gives us, he lays out the entire framework for what it means to be one of his disciples. So if you have your Bibles, you can follow along. If not the words will be up here on the screen. This is Matthew chapter four, beginning in verse 17. Sorry, I said 18 earlier. Matthew 4:17. Matthew tells us, "From that time Jesus began to preach saying, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And while walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who's called Peter, and Andrew his brother, and they were casting the net into the sea for they were fishermen. And he said to them, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. And immediately they left their nets and they followed him. And going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets and he called to them and immediately they left the boat and their father and they followed him." This is the reading of God's holy word with us this morning. Would you please join me in prayer over our message today? Jesus, I pray today that you would make evident both the price and the privilege of being your disciple. Help us to count the cost so that we can find Christ worthy. Lord, challenge us today where we need to be challenged. Holy Spirit, convict us where we need to be convicted. Encourage us in whatever area that we may lack the faith or the courage to move forward, to commit, to take up our cross and to follow Jesus. Lord, I pray that you would bless our time and your word right now. I ask this in Jesus name. Amen. All right, well I said that we're going to be looking primarily at just one verse out of this passage and the verse we're going to be looking at it's right there in the middle. It's Matthew chapter four verse 19. And it just simply says this, "And he said to them, follow me and I will make you fishers of men." And in that one short sentence, Jesus gives us the entire framework of what it means to be his disciple. Follow him and he will make you a fisher of men. And so we're going to break this down thought for thought. And the first thing Jesus says is follow me. And the first thing that we need to understand is that being a disciple of Jesus requires a change of both direction and of identity. And when Jesus tells us to follow him, this is what he's calling us to do. It's a change of direction and identity. Right before calling Peter and Andrew, Matthew tells us that from that time Jesus began to preach, and this was his message. His message was, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." And we talked about this in the first week, that discipleship, following Jesus begins with repentance and faith. That you cannot follow Jesus and yet continue to live life your own way. That there needs to be a change in the trajectory of your life where you turn away from sin in repentance and you turn toward Jesus Christ in faith. You got to lay down your pride. You got to lay down your sin. You got to lay down the false idols and the ideologies of this world and submit fully to the lordship of Jesus Christ as your king. It's a change in direction, but it is also a change in identity. Discipleship, it's not just something that you do. It is something that you become. It is something that you are. That you were once a prisoner in the domain of darkness, you have now been transferred as a citizen into the kingdom of heaven. You were a slave to sin, but you have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. You've been set free. You've been adopted into the household of God. You are now a child of God. You are now a new creation in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. A radical transformation of identity takes place when you become a disciple of Jesus Christ. I'm going to read one of Jesus' most famous teachings that he gave his disciples about what it means to follow him. And if you never heard this, if you've never read this before, this is shocking. Matthew 16 verse 24. Jesus told his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, if anyone wants to follow me and be my disciple, then let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." We talk so much about the cross. Sometimes you forget what that really is. This is the most gruesome form of execution and punishment and existence in that world. Jesus saying, this is what it looks like to follow me. You're going to have to die to yourself. You're going to have to pick up your cross. You're never going to find true life. You're never going to find your true self, your true identity until you lose it, till you lay down your old life. That to be born again as a child of God, you need to die to yourself. That to be accepted as a disciple of Jesus, you need to deny yourself, deny your selfish, proud, rebellious heart and surrender your life to Jesus Christ. And what we see is that Jesus offers us this glorious new identity, but with it comes a radical change in direction, one that is going to require total surrender. And so Jesus calls these first disciples and immediately they leave everything. They leave their nets, they leave their boats, their livelihoods, their family. They leave it all to follow Jesus. And before we go any further today, this is what we need to ask ourself. This is what I want you to ask yourself. What have you given up for the gospel? What have you needed to leave behind to follow Jesus? Or what do you know that you're being called to leave behind, to let go of right now? Are there things that you know should be giving up, that you need to be letting go of, leaving behind, surrendering in order to fully follow Jesus as you know that you ought? Peter and Andrew, James and John, they left everything. Now this doesn't mean that every Christian needs to leave their job and leave their family and go be a missionary somewhere across the world, but not all of us are going to be called to that, but we are going to all be called to something. So what is the Holy Spirit putting on your heart right now? Is there something there that you're holding on to? Is something there that's holding you back from following Jesus as you ought? The only way to come to Christ is with the empty hands of faith, right? It's hard to embrace God when you got your arms already wrapped around the world, when your hands are full, when you're clinging to things that you know need to let go of.Hebrews 12:1 says, "Since we're surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin in which clings so closely." Just whatever is holding you, whatever you're tangled up and cast it aside, let it go. And then in your freedom in Christ, "Run with endurance the race that is set before us." How? "By looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him." He went that distance for us. "Seeing the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God." In Luke 14, Jesus is going about, he's preaching and large crowds of people begin to follow him. And in verse 27, he turns to these crowds and he says, "Listen, whoever doesn't bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you desiring to build a tower does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?" "Otherwise, when he has laid the foundation and is not able to finish it, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, this man began to build and was not able to finish. Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with 10,000 men to come against him with 20,000?" "And if not, while the other is he had a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace." So therefore, and this is his point, "So therefore any one of you who does not renounce all that he has, cannot be my disciple." What is it going to cost to follow a man who carried a cross? Jesus wasn't interested in drawing crowds, fair-weather fans, right? He wasn't coming so that he could clean up our lives a little bit or do some renovations here and there. He wants to come into your life. He wants to tear the whole house down. He wants to lay a new foundation, one that's going to last, one that he can build your life on for eternity. He wasn't looking for fair-weather fans, he's looking for people ready to deny themselves, ready to take up their cross, ready to follow him and lay their lives at his feet and say, Lord, not my will but yours be done. This is what it means to follow Jesus. We can't talk about discipleship without counting the cost. What is it going to cost? Are you willing to pay that price? I'm going to leave us here in this tension for a while. We'll come back at the end. I'll give you some resolution to this, but we're going to move on for now. And just understand that when Jesus says, follow me, he means take up your cross and follow me. But second, he says, follow me and I will make you. That if you follow Jesus, he's going to change your life. He's going to transform you. And the second point today we're going to be looking at is that being a disciple, it also requires a change of heart and behavior. To really grasp this, what Jesus is saying here and what's going on, you got to understand a little bit about first century Judaism because this idea of discipleship, it's maybe a word that we're familiar with, but it's not a word that's like commonly used or understood in our culture. It was very common in their culture back then. Everyone knew what a disciple was. They'd received disciples out and about following their rabbis around town. A disciple was a student who would come under the teaching and the instruction and the discipline of a rabbi, but they weren't just a student. See, first century Jewish kids, from an early age, they would begin the work of memorizing the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament. And as these children grew up, there would come a time where the very best, the very brightest students might perhaps be offered the rare and distinguished honor of being called by a rabbi to be his disciple. And accepting this invitation it meant you had to leave everything. You had to leave your old life, you had to leave your family, the family business. They would leave everything not to follow their rabbi, not just to learn from the rabbi, but to live with the rabbi, to spend every moment with the rabbi trying to learn all that they could to become like their rabbi in every way being a disciple. What it meant was living life in the presence of your rabbi, close proximity, close relationship. And the goal was so that you could really in every way become just like them. And this is exactly what we see Jesus did with his 12 disciples. They follow him around. Everywhere he went, they watched how he lived, they heard him talk, they served with him, they went on missions together with him, and they were learning to be like him in every way. And so we have to ask, what are the implications of this for us today? And really to be a disciple today, it doesn't mean anything different than what it meant for the disciples back then. The difference is Jesus isn't here with us physically. We don't follow him around, the man Jesus Christ in a physical body, but he pours his spirit out upon his church so that yeah, spiritually we live our life in the presence of our rabbi Jesus Christ with him, going where he goes, doing what he says. And I say that because Christians today, we often want to reduce discipleship to like a program or a class or a one-on-one mentorship with a more mature believer. And none of those things are bad. They're just not what we're talking about. There are just such a long ways off from what the New Testament is talking about when it uses this word disciple. And so being a disciple of Jesus, it means living like the 12. It means living in fellowship with other disciples. But you're not following them, you're following Jesus, you're following him together. And so we can't reduce this to meeting with a mentor. We can't reduce it to going and attending a seminar or a Sunday school class or anything like that. When we're talking about the discipleship we're talking about living in community and fellowship with other disciples who are together following Jesus, living life in his presence by the power of his Holy Spirit. Following Jesus, abiding in Jesus, abiding in his spirit, abiding in his word together. And so what this means is two things. First of all, it means that disciples need to follow Jesus personally. And secondly, it means that disciples cannot follow Jesus privately. Personally, if you're a member of Mosaic or if you've taken our membership class, you know that one of the things we talk about in that class is that we have seven expectations of members here at Mosaic. And the first expectation that we have for our members is that each and every one of us strive spiritually. That we each take a personal responsibility for living life in the presence of Christ, of striving to build that relationship with Christ ourselves, of working out our own salvation with fear and trembling. This comes from Philippians chapter two verse 12. Paul says, "Therefore, my beloved, as you've always obeyed, so now not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure." You work out your own salvation personally because God is working in you personally. But bigger than that, the idea that Paul's really getting at here is that he wants this church to know and to understand and to never forget that he is not their pope, he's not their priest, he's not their rabbi. Jesus is. And this is important, the Philippians were not called to be disciples of Paul. They weren't called to follow Paul, they weren't called to live their lives in the presence of Paul. They were called to follow Jesus. And thankfully they were a church that really didn't struggle with this very much. They were a relatively healthy and mature and solid church. There was another church that Paul cared about that did struggle with this quite a bit. It was the church in Corinth. We did a whole sermon series on first and second Corinthians called Prodigal Church. And the reason we called it that is because this was a church that had some issues. They struggled with a lot of things and this was one of them. And so in first Corinthians chapter one, one of the very first things that Paul addresses with them is this. He says, "I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you all agree and that there be no division among you, but that you all be united in the same mind and the same judgment for it has been reported to me by Chloe's people that there's quarreling among you brothers." And this is what I mean. "What I mean is that each one of you says, well, I follow Paul or I follow Apollos or I follow Cephas, that's Peter, or I follow Christ." He says, "Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul?" Corinthian Church was pretty immature and dysfunctional at times and you read the letter that Paul wrote to them. He gives them a lot of correction. The Philippian church, however, was relatively strong and healthy. He addresses this same thing with them, but does so from way of encouragement and reminder. And so when you read the book of Philippians, one of the things you got to keep in mind, and you see this throughout the book, if you're reading it closely, one of the things you see is that Paul is writing to them from a place in his life where he doesn't know that he is much longer to live, right? This could be his last correspondence with them. He may never see them again. There's a very real chance that he may be facing death, even execution sometime in the near future. And he's not sure, but he wants to write to them to remind them that they're going to be fine without him. Because from the very beginning, they were not his church. God used him in a very special way as an apostle to help this church get started. But what they really needed to understand was that they were not Paul's church. They were Jesus' church. Paul wasn't their pope. Paul wasn't their priest, their mediator or their rabbi. The word that Paul uses to describe his relationship with them. He says, "I was your partner." We were partners in the gospel. We were disciples following Jesus together. And this is why he opens his letter in Philippians chapter one. He says, "I thank my God and all of my remembrance for you, always in all my prayers of mine for you, all making my prayers with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Christ Jesus." Well, who is the he that Paul is referring to here, right? Because Paul is the one who kind of planted this church, but Paul's not referring to himself. The he who began the good work that Paul is talking about is Jesus Christ. That Jesus will complete this good work even if Paul's no longer around. And this is how he starts his letter and then he encourages them with the same thing again at the end. Like, okay Paul, if you go, if you leave us, if you die, who's going to take care of us as a church? And he tells them in Philippians 4:19. He says, "My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in Christ Jesus." Regardless of whether Paul lived or died, what mattered was that Christ would be with them till the end of the age. And that Paul had full confidence that he would make sure even in Paul's absence, that Jesus would finish the good work that he had started in this church. And I say all this because this is what making disciples is all about. It's about teaching people to become independently dependent on Jesus. To become independent in the sense that they're not dependent on us or any other human being for their spiritual wellbeing and to become dependent on Jesus Christ who really is the head of the church, the chief shepherd of every church. And so this might be a paradigm shift for a lot of Christians. It was for the early church as well because this is not how the religious leaders of their day behave. The religious leaders of their day, they very much gathered people around themselves who were dependent on them, who looked to them as spiritual authorities, as mediators between them and God. But Jesus warned his disciples not to be like them, that as his followers that they were going to need to be different, that they could not go on and fall into the same footsteps of the other religious leaders of their day. And Jesus actually had very harsh words for some of these religious leaders. In Matthew chapter 23, he's warning his disciples about this and in verse five he says, "First of all, they do all of their deeds to be seen by others. They love to make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long." They like to show off their spiritual maturity. "And they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces, and they love being called rabbi by others, but you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher and you are all brothers. And call no man your father on earth for you of one Father who is in heaven. Neither be called instructor for you have one instructor, the Christ." He says, "The greatest among you shall be your servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, but whoever humbles himself will be exalted." Now, I don't think Jesus is trying to argue about semantics and titles and calling people teacher or whatever that may be, but he's trying to make a point and the point is this, there's only one Father and by the blood of Jesus Christ, God can be your Father, but God can't be your grandfather. You can't be dependent on some other earthly father to be the mediator between you and God the Father. Only Jesus Christ can do that. There is one teacher, one rabbi, and Jesus can be your rabbi, but he can't be your rabbi's rabbi. He can't be your pastor's pastor. You need that relationship with him yourself. Jesus can call you friend, but he can't be a friend of a friend. The big idea is every single Christian needs to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ for themselves. As Paul said in first Timothy 2:5 that, "There is one God and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself as a ransom for all." This mission to go and to make disciples is not a mission to go and make disciples of ourselves. It's a mission to go and make disciples of Jesus. It's not a mission to go out and to become the mediator between God and men. The mission is to point people to the only mediator that there is, the man Jesus Christ. If I had to sum it all up, I would put it like this, that the call of discipleship... Well, first of all, it's a call to be a disciple, to be yourself connected to Christ, abiding in Christ, living in the presence of Christ, following your rabbi. But the call to make disciples is a call for those who are doing that, for those who are more mature in the faith, to help those who are less mature in the faith, become more mature in the faith, by becoming less dependent on them and more dependent on Jesus. That was a lot. So I'm going to say it again. That the call to make disciples is a call for those who are more mature in the faith to help those who are less mature in the faith, become more mature in the faith by becoming less dependent on them and more dependent on Jesus Christ, where you're teaching them to cling to Christ, to abide in Christ, to pursue Christ, to follow Jesus, and to live their lives in his presence. Yesterday our daughter Nora had a birthday party. She's turning eight tomorrow and with our kids we don't do the big huge birthday party every year. But we told them both, when you turn eight years old, you can do the big party where you invite the whole class and everything. So we did the whole trampoline park thing and celebrated her birthday and it was a ton of fun. Now every parent in the room knows when these birthdays come along its bittersweet because it's like how do they grow up so fast? I remember just as clear as it was yesterday, the day that she was born and now she's eight years old and it's hard to see them grow up. You just kind of want them to stay little forever. My wife saw one of these sappy parenting memes the other day, said something like, one day you're going to pick your child up and not realize it will be the last time you put them back down. First of all, how dare you? Like the internet is supposed to be a nice happy place, I thought. You say that and all the moms... It was more pronounced in the first service because we had all the MiniMo parents here. All the moms are like crying. All the dads coincidentally have something stuck in their eye and it's like, what? You just want them to stay little and cute forever, just hold on. They're so sweet and innocent. And we as parents, we think that way. God doesn't think that way. God doesn't want his kids to stay little for... He wants them to grow up fast, to grow up healthy and strong and mature. He wants them to grow up to be independent in the sense that they're not dependent on people or things, but dependent on himself. Because unlike us, unlike our kids, when God's kids grow up, they don't grow up by becoming less dependent on him as they mature. As God's children's mature, they mature in doing so, they begin to see how really totally and utterly dependent on God they really are. They become less dependent on people, on things, and they become more dependent on God himself. That's what it means to grow up, to mature in the faith, to live every moment with this awareness and dependency on your heavenly Father. And so what this means is like, yeah, a newborn baby Christian, they might need to be held, they might need to be fed for a while as they start to grow, they might need someone there to hold their hand as they learn how to walk. For a little while that's okay, but that's not the goal. The goal is not to coddle them, not to become the spiritual equivalent of helicopter parents. The goal is to help them grow up, push them out of the nest, teach them to feed themselves, teach them to walk on their own so that they can begin helping others to do the same. And John 15:5, Jesus said, "I'm the vine, you're the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing." That the only way for a disciple to be healthy, to grow and to bear fruit is not to be a branch of a branch of a branch. It's to be a branch directly connected and abiding in the vine of Jesus Christ. And so disciples need to follow Jesus personally, but disciples can't follow Jesus privately. That you need to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ but this doesn't mean that you should have a private relationship with Jesus Christ. I said this last week, I'm going to say it again. You almost never see Jesus in the gospels. You never any of the apostles. You almost never see them in a private one-on-one setting with anyone, like everything that Jesus did, he did in a communal setting. And Jesus knew each one of his disciples personally. He called each one of his disciples personally. He loved and he cared for each one of his disciples personally. But he spent almost all of his time with each one of his disciples in community, with the three, with the 12, with the 72. There's always a group of people around him, and I say this because sometimes we want to kind of narrowly define discipleship as like a one-on-one mentorship and that can be useful for a time, for a task, for a purpose. But when you read the New Testament, everything that you see happening is happening in the context of community. It's the body of Christ united working together. That's where people grow. And I said this earlier, I want to demystify discipleship. Discipleship is costly, but it shouldn't be complicated. And when you look at the example of Jesus, when you look at the example of the early church, what you find is there's really only four things that you need as a disciple of Jesus to grow in your faith. It's four things. You need the truth of God's word. You need the power, the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life. You need the fellowship of the church. And you need the experiences of life. You need God's word to cut to your heart, to reveal truth, to correct your understanding, to give you knowledge. You need God's Holy Spirit to bring conviction of sin, to bring assurance of your salvation. The Holy Spirit is needed. The Holy Spirit equips the members of the body so that they can minister with their gifts to one another. You need the word, you need the spirit. You need the fellowship of the church. You need the rest of the body holding you up and holding you accountable. And then you need the experience of life. And this is everyone, regardless of whether you're a disciple of Jesus or not, you're going to get the experiences of life. We're all going to go through the storms of life. How you go through those are dependent on those first three things. You go through the storms of life alone, they're going to crush you. Go through the storms of life with the power of God's Spirit and the fellowship with the church and the truth of his word. God's going to use those very experiences to grow your faith, your character, your perseverance to strengthen you. And so if you're living in the presence of Jesus, if you are in fellowship with other spirit-filled believers and together submitting your lives to the truth and to the authority of God's word, you are going to grow in your faith. It's not complicated. It takes commitment, it takes time. It takes patience and perseverance, but you will grow. And this is why if you know us as a church, we don't focus a lot of time in just offering a thousand different classes or seminars or programs. We focus so much time and care and attention into our community groups because this is where growth happens. Every week spirit-filled people coming together as the body of Christ around the truth of God's word. We're there together in community and that is where the Holy Spirit works in us and through us, to strengthen us, to guide us, to help us, to abide each firmly connected to the vine of Jesus Christ so that we can bear fruit as we go through the experiences of life together, the ups, the downs, the joys, the pains, all of it. God has ordained for our growth. There's a really beautiful picture of this in Ephesians chapter four that kind of shows how this all is intended to work. Ephesians 4:1. "I therefore, a prisoner of the Lord urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace. There's one body and one Spirit just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call. One Lord, one faith, one baptism when God and Father of all who is overall and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gifts." So first of all, Paul begins to show this picture of the unity of the body and of the power of the Father's Holy Spirit present in each member of the body. But then he says, within the unity of the body there is distinction among the members. That God equips the body, different people, members of the body in different ways and that they all need to work together to grow up together into maturity. And so he continues in verse 11, he says, "This is why he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, for building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes, rather speaking the truth in love. We are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ. From whom the whole body joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love." When Jesus says, I will make you, when Jesus tells us he's going to change our lives, this is how he does it as one body with many members, each equipped by the Holy Spirit to come and to work together under the headship of Jesus Christ, growing in unity, growing as one. And the idea here is if you abide in this, you will grow. That Jesus will make you new. He will bear his fruit in your life. He will give you and transform your heart, your behavior, your character. You will be conformed to the fullness, the image of Christ. So that's point number two. Point number three, being a disciple requires a change of heart and behavior. It also requires a change of purpose and perspective. And so I said I was going to leave you in that tension. We counting the cost of discipleship, going to kind of come back to that. Now, from our perspective in this life, when you look at the cost of following Jesus, right? Deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow him. That's a high price. That seems like that cost might be too much. It is high, and Jesus calls us to consider that cost before following him. He calls us to consider that cost. Then he challenges us to consider it again and to consider it from an eternal perspective. Because if you keep going in Matthew 16, the verse we read earlier, Jesus told the disciples, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." He tells them that, but then he gives them like... Well, let's look at this from a different angle. Let's look at this from an eternal perspective. Four verse 25. "Whoever would save his life will lose it, whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? What should a man give in return for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels and the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done." What Jesus wants to see is on the one hand the discipleship is costly and on the other hand, it's not nearly as costly as the alternative. What is it profit a man if he gains the whole world, all the money, all the fame, all the friends and praise and power and comforts of this world and yet loses his soul? What shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Whatever following Jesus may cost you right now and the grand scope of eternity, it is a small price to pay. That Jesus says, "I'm coming, and when I do, I'm coming in the glory of my Father and I'm going to repay each person according to what they've done." And every single one of us, we need to have this perspective. We need to see things from this angle, when we do, what we see is that the true cost of discipleship, it's not a price to be paid, it is an investment to be made. You invest your life savings, you give everything that you have, you give it all to Christ and you live life through the bear market of this life, but you do so knowing that in the end that the bulls are going to win, that the investment is going to pay off. That Jesus is coming soon and that your sacrifice, everything that you give up right now, it is earning you spiritual dividends right now and it's earning you heavenly rewards when Christ returns. Mark 10. Peter comes up to Jesus and he's like, look, "Jesus, we left everything to follow you." And Jesus says in verse 29, he says, "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brother or sister or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time. Houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and land with persecutions and in the age to come eternal life." In Matthew chapter 13, Jesus shares a few parables and to show us what this is like. He says in verse 44, "That the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure that's hidden in a field which a man found and he covered up. And then in his joy, he goes and he sells all that he has and buys that field." And the idea is from one perspective, this guy seems like a fool, right? He just gave his life savings to buy a worthless piece of dirt, an empty field. And yet from another perspective, you see that he didn't give up anything at all. That whatever he laid down to purchase that field could not compare to the infinite glory of riches that were buried beneath the surface that no one else could see. Jesus says again in verse 45, "That the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who on finding one pearl of great value." He goes out and he sells all that he has to buy it. And Jesus gives us this new perspective to think about discipleship and with this perspective, he gives us new purpose as well. That he says, "Follow me and I'm going to make you." And what is he going to make us? Ultimately he says, he's going to make you fishers of men. That's the purpose. Think about that purpose in the context of this new perspective that we have. Jesus asks, "What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and yet loses his soul?" Well flip that around. What does it profit a man if he gives up everything he has right now for the sake of the gospel, in order to gain the souls of others for eternity? Jesus wants to make us fishers of men. You think about that. Jesus wants to give you the opportunity right now as his disciple to play a part in altering the eternal destiny of souls, to play a part in changing the eternal destination of people. You talk about heavenly rewards, like imagine seeing someone in heaven and knowing that Jesus used your witness, your faithfulness, your sacrifice to get them there. Imagine the joy of walking in and seeing that person and knowing that they will be spending eternity in paradise, in the presence of Christ, and that you got to play a part in that. Before telling the parable of the prodigal son, Jesus told two other parables to the same effect in Luke chapter 15. In the context we're told that, "Tax collectors and sinners were drawing near to him and the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling about it, saying, "This man receives sinners and he eats with them." And so he told them this parable. He says, "What man of you having a hundred sheep if he has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open country and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he is found it, he lays it on his shoulder rejoicing and when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying, rejoice with me for I found my sheep that was lost. Just so I tell you, there's more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance." "Or what woman having 10 silver coins if she loses one does not light a lamp and sweep the house and see diligently until she finds it. And when she's found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors saying, rejoice with me for I found the coin that I lost. Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents." Who are we that we should be given the privilege, the joy of taking part in something like this? There is great joy we're told in heaven right now when one sinner repents, imagine the joy then. Imagine the joy when all the saints go marching into the joy of their master together and you see those souls that led you to Christ, and you see those people that Jesus used you in their life to lead them to Christ, to help them to grow in Christ. Imagine that joy of being there together. We do not deserve such an honor, and yet we serve a God of amazing grace. When you have this perspective and this purpose, it changes everything. And when you have this perspective and this purpose, all of a sudden everything seems, as Paul said in second Corinthians, it's like "Light and momentary affliction which is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison." For why? Because, "We are not looking to things that are seen, but the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal." Well, I could spend a whole lot more time talking about this theoretically, rather, what I would like you to do is I would like you to go into your community groups this week and talk about how you've experienced this for yourself personally. Share testimonies of God's grace. Jesus calls us fishermen and fishermen love to tell stories. And so tell some of those stories. I think we're going to be spending a lot of time in heaven telling fishermen stories of how Jesus used us to bring other people to faith or used other people to save us or lead us to himself. Share some of those stories this week. If you've played a part in leading someone else to Christ or share the stories of those who played a part in leading you to Christ, not to boast in yourself but to boast as Paul says in Jesus Christ, and to be an encouragement to one another. Share some of those stories this week. And if you're not connected to a community group, this is a really good week to get connected to a community group. If you don't take anything else away from the sermon, this is what I would hope you would take, that you need to be connected to a community, to have fellowship with other people in a meaningful way. And so we would love to help you do that. You can check those out on our website, or better yet, just stop by the welcome center out there and there's people there that would love to help you find a group that works for you. And then if you're here today and you are not yet connected to Christ, if you are ready to make that commitment, to become a follower of Christ, to become a disciple of Jesus Christ, we would love to talk to you about that as well. You can talk to people at the welcome center or Pastor Andy and I will be up here after the service. We'd love to talk to you about that. We could talk to you about baptism or just if you have any questions about Christianity in general, we'd be happy to talk to you, pray with you about that as well. Well, right now, let's pray and we'll spend more time worshiping together. Jesus, we thank you. We praise you so much for the price that you paid to save us. And I pray that you would give us now the grace and the strength and the courage to gladly pay, to gladly suffer and sacrifice whatever is needed to be your witnesses, your followers, your disciples here on earth right now. God help us to take up our crosses daily to follow you, knowing that as our good shepherd that you have promised to lead us into pastures of abundant life. Give us faith to believe that whatever we may have to give up right now in terms of worldly comforts and pleasure, they cannot compare to the spiritual blessings, the eternal rewards that await those who follow you. So Lord, help us to keep our eyes fixed, not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. Help us to keep our eyes fixed on you, Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that was set before you endured the cross for us, and you're now seated in glory and power at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. Father, we love you, we praise you, and now we just want to worship you together in the name of your son, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit To Evangelism

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 5, 2023 52:28


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. If you have your Bibles, go ahead and open up to Matthew 28. We are in week three of our sermon series Committed. We've been talking about the essential habits of an abundant life in Christ, and what I've been saying over these last couple of weeks is we're taking this time to focus on some of the essential, non-negotiable, super practical commitments that every Christian must make in order to grow in their faith, in order to persevere through trials, in order to fulfill God's purpose and calling for their life, and in order to experience and to enjoy this abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give us. Two weeks ago, we started off by talking about the commitment to follow Jesus as our Lord, as our savior, as our good shepherd. Last week we talked about committing to a local church and the importance of having a church, having fellowship with other believers to support us, encourage us, and hold us accountable as we follow Jesus. This week we're going to talk about evangelism. Our sermon is called Commit to Evangelism. At the end of last week's passage in Acts 2, verse 47 tells us that the early church, these early Christians were praising God and having favor with all of the people, and the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved. If you're here last week, you remember we talked about how these early Christians were committed. They were devoted to sharing their lives with one another sacrificially. They were deeply committed to one another and the church. But this doesn't mean that they were just a holy huddle of the frozen chosen as we joke about some churches being today. They were a church on a mission. We talked a little bit about how the church can be thought of in the metaphor of a ship. That we as a church, we're not trying to be a cruise ship, we're trying to be a battleship. On a cruise ship, everyone shows up and everyone shows up to be served and to be entertained. You float around in circles. You wind up right back where you started. On a battleship, everyone shows up to serve. Everyone shows up because we're all working together with same purpose, same mission, and we're going to be spending these next two weeks talking about what that mission is, focusing on what has come to be called the Great Commission and two aspects of that Great Commission. If you're not familiar with the Great Commission, this is basically Jesus' final marching orders to the church, his final instructions that he leaves before ascending to the right hand of the Father in heaven. We can find it in Matthew 28. This is where we're going to be begin our time today, Matthew 28 beginning in verse 28. This is what it says. It says that Jesus came to them, came to his disciples, and he said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." You see the two aspects of this mission, right? First of all, there's this outward mission. Jesus says, "You need to go into all the world and make disciples." That's evangelism. That's what we're going to be talking about today. The second aspect of the mission is more inward where Jesus says, "And then you need to teach them to observe all that I have commanded you to do." That's discipleship. We'll be talking more about that next week. Discipleship is focused on the mission of sanctification. Evangelism is focused on the mission of conversion. Already, hopefully, I wouldn't be surprised if everyone's feeling a little bit uncomfortable. I'm surprised. After last week telling you we were going to talk about evangelism today, I'm like, good to see that some of you came back, because this is not something that we get particularly comfortable with thinking about converting people, proselytizing, things like that. They're not popular concepts in our culture. I don't know if I would use the word proselytizing, but we are going to talk about we do want to convert people to Christianity. We want to persuade people to believe and to follow Jesus Christ. I remember the first time that I ever visited Boston. We were downtown doing kind of the touristy thing. My wife and I were there. Our son Owen, he was about nine months old at the time. We're walking around in the Boston Commons and we're making our way toward Park Street Station. There's these two younger girls behind us having a very loud, very passionate discussion. One of them was pleading passionately with her friend trying to warn her to never read anything by this author that she discovered named C.S. Lewis and to never read the book The Chronicles of Narnia because she had found out that this guy was actually a Christian and he was secretly trying to convert people with his books. If you know anything about C.S. Lewis, there wasn't anything secret about it. He's pretty on the nose about everything that he wrote. He was overtly a Christian. Chronicles of Narnia, it's a straight-up allegory of Christianity. He wasn't trying to hide any of that. But what stuck out to me about that conversation was as I'm listening to these girls have their discussion, really what she was doing was she was trying to convert her friend. She was trying to convert her friend to this position of non-conversion. Providentially, the next morning we got up and we visited Mosaic for the first time and Pastor Jan was preaching on that exact topic, on this idea of the world trying to convert people to this position of non-conversion. This girl was hypocritically doing the very thing that she was condemning someone else, C.S. Lewis in this case, of doing. The question then is, why are we then so afraid to do that ourselves as Christians? Non-Christians do it all the time. People in general do it all the time. If you believe that something is true and if you believe that that truth matters, well, then it's only natural that you're going to try to persuade other people to accept it and to believe it as well, even if the truth is inconvenient, even if the truth is uncomfortable. Love would compel you to plead with others to accept it and believe it. A good doctor wouldn't hide the truth from their patient. A good doctor will share their diagnosis and prescription even if that truth is not necessarily what the patient wants to hear, because withholding that would be unloving. It would be unprofessional. It could be deadly. I think part of the reason that many Christians are afraid to share their faith is that we have this fear of rejection. I've shared the gospel with several people in Boston, and more often than not, that's been met with rejection. Every single time it's uncomfortable. But what my experiences taught me is that even though in sharing the gospel, yeah, I have faced a lot of rejection, it usually doesn't come as the form that I'm afraid of. It usually doesn't come in the form of anger or hostility. It's usually just kind of more of a Stoic response of like, "Oh, that's interesting or that's nice. I'm glad that that worked for you, but not really something I'm interested in myself." It's not the response that I hoped for, but it's also really not a response that should cause us to be afraid to share the gospel in the first place. I say that just to say don't be anxious, don't catastrophize what might possibly happen when you share the gospel because you really don't know. You don't know how they're going to respond. You can't control how they're going to respond. You might be surprised to discover that a lot of people are more open and more comfortable to talking about these things than you might assume. Sometimes we are reluctant to share the gospel out of fear of rejection. I think most Christians, however, are reluctant to share the gospel out of a fear of failure. I think a lot of Christians, maybe they want to share the gospel, they have a desire, they know that it's something they ought to do, but they're worried about failure because they don't feel equipped. What if they ask me a question I don't know how to answer? What if I say something wrong? We can't control how people are going to respond to the message, but there are things that we can do to prepare ourselves and to be equipped to share that message more effectively when we have opportunities to do so. That's really what I want to spend our time focusing more on today. Toward the end of our time this morning, I'm going to share just some rapid fire practical tips for evangelism. But to begin with, I want us to just start by looking at three biblical truths, three realities, three things that Jesus equips us with in order to help us overcome this fear of sharing the gospel. If you have your Bibles, we're going to be launching out of Matthew 28, but we're going to be doing a survey of many scriptures that will help us understand these things. Before we begin, let's pray and then we'll jump into the message together. Jesus, you told your disciples that they should pray to the Lord of the harvest, that the harvest is great, but the workers are few. Pray to the Lord of the harvest to raise up more workers for this mission. Lord, we pray that you would do that. Even right now, Lord, I pray that you would be doing that. Lord, we know that immediately after instructing his disciples to pray, he then sends them out to do the very thing, to be the answer to their very own prayers and to go and to preach the gospel. Lord, I pray that you would help us today to see that you have saved us in order to send us. That you have called us, you have commissioned us, and you have equipped us. That you do not send us out alone, you do not send us out, but you send us out fully equipped to do what you have called to do. That you have given us the authority of your word. You've given us the presence and the power of your Holy Spirit. You've given us the fellowship of the church. We have everything we need to accomplish this mission together. Lord, I pray that you would give us grace to do so. God, we pray right now that you just bless our time and your holy word this morning. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, well, the first truth, the first reality that I want us to look at, that we need to understand and believe that's going to help us overcome our fear of sharing the gospel is this, that Jesus equips us and he sends us with both the clarity and the authority of his word. That Jesus doesn't send us out with a long list of complicated religious rights and rituals and rules. We sang this earlier, that it's finished, it is accomplished. There's no work that we can do to further this mission that the message of the mission is very simple. It's so simple that it can be summed up here in just a couple of sentences. It's so deep, it's so sophisticated that you can spend the rest of your life devoting yourself to it and never master it. There's always room to grow. You can spend the rest of your life studying scripture, growing and maturing in the Holy Spirit. What is the mission? There's a story in the Gospel of Matthew where a religious leader, a teacher of the religious law comes up to Jesus and he wants to know, he wants to ask him, "Jesus, what is the greatest of all of the commandments?" In Matthew 22:37, Jesus said to him, he said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all of your soul and with all of your mind. This is the great and the first commandment. And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depends all the law and the prophets." All the Old Testament, the law, the prophets, they're all summed up on these two things, to love God with everything and to love your neighbor as yourself. The mission of the church is simply this, the Great Commission is to simply live that out and then to teach others to do the same. Repent of your sin. Put your faith in Jesus Christ. Commit to follow him, to obey him, to observe all that he has commanded. To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself and then to teach others to do the same. The mission is simple, the mission is clear, but that doesn't mean that it's easy. Following Jesus is going to be hard. Taking this message to the ends of the earth is going to be hard. Just taking this message across the hallway, across the street, across the cubicle is going to be hard. We need to understand that Jesus doesn't merely send us out with a clear mission, he also sends us out with clear authority. I think one of the best explanations of these two realities coming together can be seen in 2 Corinthians 5:17-21. The apostle Paul says this, he says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed, and behold, the new has come. All of this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you and on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God. For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." It's very clear the message, that Jesus Christ became sin for us. He took our sin upon himself on the cross. He paid the penalty that we deserve so that we could become the righteousness of God, so that we could be forgiven, reconciled to God through this ministry of reconciliation. That's the message. The mission is then to go with this message and to reconcile people to God. The authority then is that we are not going out alone. We're not going out in our own authority. We are going out sent by the king, sent as ambassadors of Christ for proclaiming this good news about his kingdom. All that to say is don't make the mission overly complicated. Evangelism simply means to announce the good news that Jesus is king. Human beings are sinners. Jesus is the savior. He is Lord, he is king, and he has now sent us as his ambassadors of his kingdom, sent us to warn the world that he is going to come again to judge the world in righteousness, but also sent to proclaim this good news that the king is coming right now. He's offering amnesty that right now this king has made a way to reconcile the world to himself. He is offering terms of peace for all who would repent, believe, for all who would lay down their arms and surrender, commit their allegiance to him as the good and the rightful king that he is. C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, he put it like this. He said, "Enemy occupied territory, that is what this world is. Christianity is the story of how the rightful king has landed, and you might say landed in disguise, and is calling us to take part of a great campaign of sabotage." We're going out as ambassadors on this rescue mission, recruiting people to the kingdom of God. Sharing the gospel is intimidating because it's intimidating to go and to walk into enemy occupied territory. But we do this with a clear mission, with a clear message, and with a clear authority of knowing that we have been sent by the true, the good, the rightful king. When you're feeling fearful about sharing your faith, remember this, that every time that you speak the words of scripture and share God's word, every time that you proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, that Jesus is not just with you, but as this text just said, he's actually making his appeal through you, calling people to himself to be reconciled, to make peace through his bloodshed on the cross. 2 Timothy 3:14-17 tells us that, "All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching and for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." Every good work that we'll ever be called to do. Scripture equips us for all of that. The first step to overcoming our fear is to know God's word, to know that his word is authoritative and true. It is living and active. It equips us for every good work, and so that we shouldn't be ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ because we know it is the power of God unto salvation. Point number two, Jesus sends us out with the clarity and the authority of his word. He also sends us out with the courageous readiness of knowing and of resting in his sovereignty. Ephesians 6:14, Paul tells us to, "Stand firm, therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace." That God's sovereignty and salvation should replace our fear with this incredible courage and a readiness to share the gospel. Because when you think about this, what does this mean, God's sovereignty? It means that he has the power to save anyone, anytime, anywhere, even the people that we least expect. Nobody knew this better than the apostle Paul himself, right? I mean, this was the guy who was a violent persecutor of the church. No one ever expected this guy to get saved. He hated Christians. He had made it his mission to snuff out the Christian movement wherever he could find it, and yet Jesus finds him. Jesus saves him. Jesus gave him a new mission and turns him into the greatest missionary that the church has ever seen. Paul knew that if Jesus could save him, well, Jesus could save anyone. Why should he be afraid? Why should he be fearful of sharing this good news with anyone wherever he goes, no matter what opposition, no matter what persecution he often faced. Consider the life of Paul with me for a moment. Just going to take a look at an episode of his life from the Book of Acts. In Acts 14, Paul is preaching the gospel in Lystra. As he's there, as he's preaching a gospel, this angry mob shows up, drags him out of town, stones him, leaves him for dead. Do you remember what it says what Paul does after he eventually wakes up not dead? It seems like you can go down a whole rabbit trail on this. Reading the Book of Galatians, Paul kind of eludes like maybe he actually died. He has this out of body experience, and then he comes back. We don't know. But he's stoned and left for dead. He wakes up eventually. He regains consciousness. And what does he do? He gets back up and he goes back into the town where the people just mobbed him, dragged him out, and stoned him and left him for dead. Incredible courage and boldness. He then leaves. He makes his way onto Philippi. In Philippi, he gets arrested again. He's beaten with rods. After that, it goes to Thessaloniki. Again, angry mob in Thessaloniki. Escapes by night to Berea where he's faced with yet another angry mob of people. He goes through Athens, makes his way to Corinth. And once again, we're told that he was met with those people who opposed and reviled him. I don't know about you, by this point, I'd be feeling a little bit discouraged. Mob me once, shame on you. Mob me 17, 18, 19 times, I must be doing something wrong. I should go take a class on evangelism or something. I don't know. What keeps Paul going? What kept him going was his belief in the sovereignty of God. That despite all the opposition that he faced, all the persecution that he experienced, that in each of these cities, people were getting saved, churches were being planted, lives were being transformed, legacies were being built. In the midst of all of this, in Acts 17, when Paul is in Corinth, God came to him in a vision during the night. In Acts 17:9-11, it says this that the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision. He said, "Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent, for I am with you and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people." He stayed there a year and six months teaching the word of God among them. Paul understood that there would be many in this city who would oppose and revile him, and yet he would go on preaching the gospel because he also knew that there were many of God's elect, many of God's people here as well. His job was to preach the word. No gimmicks. No tricks. Preach the word, trust the word to do its work, trust God to draw his people to himself. That's what happened. Trust that Jesus' sheep would hear his voice and follow him. Right before getting to Corinth, Paul was in Athens. In Athens, he met with the philosophers at the Areopagus on Mars Hill. As he meets with them, he's walking through their temples. He's observing all of their idols that they've made to their many gods, and he gets to have this conversation with them. This is what he tells them in verse 26. He tells them that God made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth and determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place. That God determined where, when every person would live. So that what? Verse 27, so that they should seek God, perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he's actually not far from each of us. For in him we live and move and have our being, even as some of your own poets have said, "For indeed we are his offspring." Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of men. The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man, Jesus Christ, whom he appointed, and of this he's given full assurance to all by raising him from the dead. See, I don't think that Paul believed in coincidence. I think Paul believed in providence, and this is what gave him this courageous readiness to share the gospel no matter where he was, no matter what kind of opposition that he was facing, because he knew that God was sovereign. I think one of my favorite examples of this is when he writes to the church in Philippi. At the end of Paul's letter to the Philippians, he's sending his greetings and he tells them in Philippians 4:22, he says, "All the saints send their greetings," then he adds this little comment, "especially those of Caesar's household." At the time, Paul was in chains. He was in prison, maybe under house arrest, and he's chained to these guards from Caesar's household all day. What does he do? He doesn't get discouraged. He doesn't quit. He doesn't say, "Well, I'm here/ I'm locked up. There's nothing I can do." He says, "Well, if I'm here and I'm locked up and I'm chained to these guards, it must be because I need to share the gospel with them. You think that Lord Caesar has me chained to you? Well, I think that Lord Jesus has you chained to me, and so now you're going to hear the gospel." He begins sharing the gospel with these guards and they end up getting saved. He's just kind of showing how God is flexing here. He's like, "Oh, and by the way, the people in Caesar's household, they send you their greetings that they are now believers, that they are now following Jesus as well." If God puts people in your life, if God gives you opportunities to share the gospel, perhaps that's not a coincidence. As Paul told the philosophers, God's providence determines the allotted periods and boundaries. Perhaps he's placed you in these people's lives for a reason. We all know this. When you go to school or when you go to work or when you go home and you're amongst your neighbors, that chances are if you are a Christian living in Boston, Massachusetts, you are quite probably the only Christian that any of these people know in the city. Maybe there's a reason that God has put you in their lives. You can't save anyone. That's not your job, right? That's Jesus' department is salvation. Your job is to be a faithful witness wherever he's placed you, to scatter the seed to pray and to trust God, to bring the growth, to bring the harvest. Trust God with the results. And with this, if you don't see those results right away, don't let that discourage you either. It doesn't mean that you did something wrong. It also doesn't mean that nothing is happening. We can't always see what God is doing beneath the surface when we share the gospel with people. Just an example from my own life, I've shared this before. In a former life as a young college student in the early 2000s, I was in a pop punk band. That was a thing at the time. We were in the Midwest. You had the West Coast punk. You had the East Coast punk. We were trying to pioneer the Midwest Coast punk. What that meant was we would go to class during the week. And then on the weekends, we would load up our big white conversion van and we would hit the road. We'd drive all over the Midwest playing shows in different towns and cities, and we got to spend a lot of time just driving around on the road, having conversations with one another as members of the band. At the time, none of the other members of the band were Christians. I shared last week that I had grown up in the church, but I wasn't walking with the Lord at this time. I don't really think that I was even yet a Christian at this time. But one night, it's late at night, we're on the road and we get into this conversation about faith and Jesus and Christianity. For whatever reason, I find myself defending the faith to our bass player and our drummer, trying to convince them that Christianity is true, that Jesus really is God, that he really did fulfill all of these prophecies, and he rose from the dead. We're having this, we're going back and forth. Eventually at one point, the bass player just shut the conversation down. Not in a mean way, but just kind of like a joking like, "I don't want to talk about this. I'm getting uncomfortable kind of way." We changed the subject, moved on, and honestly didn't think about that conversation again for a really long time. Fast-forward several years, we'd split up. We'd all grown up and went out and got real jobs and still in touch, but weren't living near each other, hadn't really talked to each other for a long time. I get a phone call one day from one of the guys in the band. It wasn't the bass player or the drummer. Actually for a brief time, there was a fourth guy in our band. He was only in the band for a few months after I joined, and then he quit. I really hadn't heard or seen from him again. He called me up because he wanted to tell me that he had become a Christian. He remembered that I had grown up going to church and I was a Christian. He wanted to let me know, "I'm a Christian now. I'm leading worship in my church." He was all excited. He was all on fire. He's like, "And I want you to know that this all started for me way back because of that conversation in the van." I was like, "You weren't even part of that conversation in the van." Actually, he was sitting in the back. I thought he was asleep the whole time, and apparently he'd been paying attention and somehow some seeds had gotten planted in him that eventually led to him becoming a Christian. He's still a Christian today. He's working in ministry today, and God's doing awesome things through his life. But I share all that just to say, you never know what God does with the gospel after you've shared it with somebody. Even if you don't see those results right away, it doesn't mean that God's not doing something. Don't get discouraged. Don't lose heart. Just be faithful and continue and persevere. Jesus equips us. He sends us with clarity and authority of his word, with the courageous readiness of his sovereignty, and number three, with the comforting power of his presence. I'm going to read several passages for us, because this is really important. First one is John 14:16-18. Jesus tells his disciples, he says, "I will ask the Father and he will give you another helper to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him or knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you.: In Luke 24:26, he said to them, "Thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon. You, but stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high." Acts 1:8, Jesus again tells his disciples, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." In our passage today, he says, "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." Something happened on the day of Pentecost that we read about in Acts 2 a couple weeks ago. Something happened that day that had never happened before in the history of mankind. Before Christ in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit would come upon people for a time and for a task. But now what we see is that from now on, all of those who are in Christ, that the Holy Spirit is poured out, that the Holy Spirit dwells in us each personally and permanently. Jesus, he promised in the Great Commission, he said, "I will be with you always to the very end of the age." Obviously he's not here with us physically right now, but that's not what he was talking about. He's alluding to the gift of the Holy Spirit that he was going to pour out on his church after ascending into heaven. Jesus, he talked about this in John 16. In John 16, Jesus was talking with his disciples and he tells him this in verse five. He says, "Now I am going to him who sent me and none of you asks me, where are you going?" He said, "I'm preparing to go back to ascend to the right hand of my father. But because of I've said these things to you, sorrow has filled your hearts," which is understandable, right? You just got to spend three years in the presence of Jesus Christ physically. That would be sad to think about him leaving and ascending back to heaven. But verse seven, Jesus tells them, "Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it's to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you." I don't know if we can really grasp what a big deal that is. Jesus is literally saying what we have right now as believers, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is in some ways to our advantage that it's actually in some ways we are better off right now than if he had remained physically here with us in the flesh. That when Jesus Christ took on flesh, that he in some sense allowed his presence to be confined by time and space in a human body. But when he ascended into heaven, he poured out the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Holy Spirit of the living God upon every member of his church. That the Holy Spirit is indwelling in all Christians, in all places at all times for all times. If you are in Christ, what this means is that Christ is not just with you, he is in you. You have been clothed with power from high, scripture says. You have been filled with the Holy Spirit of God, that God is with you and for you. He will not leave you or forsake you. He's working all things together for you, working for you and in you and through you, so you can have courage. You don't need to fear. That wherever you go, you go with the comforting power of the presence of Jesus Christ with you. Paul in Ephesians 3, he just writes this amazing passage. He says, "For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven on earth is named. That according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Holy Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. That you, being rooted and grounded in love, may strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." He says, "And now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever, amen." It's too much to wrap your mind around. God is with us, that he is for us, that he is able to do abundantly more than we could ask or even imagine or hope to think. Set your minds on these things. If you're feeling fearful, if you're feeling discouraged, before you go and preach to others, preach to yourself. Remind your heart, your soul, your mind that God is sovereign, that God is faithful, that Christ is with you. He is in. He wants his spirit and his power to work through you. All right, well, I said at the beginning that I'd give you some practical tips here at the end, some just practical steps for evangelism. We don't have a lot of time, so I'm going to go through these pretty fast. Someone told me last week that my sermon had a lot of bullet points. I've only given you three this far, so I'm going to give you seven more. We're going to go really quick. This is another machine gun sermon. We're going like rapid fire through these last seven here at the end, but super practical, just seven tips for sharing your faith. First and foremost, you need to pray before you preach. We read in Ephesians, Paul said, "Stand therefore having fastened on the belt of truth and having put on the breastplate of righteousness. And as for shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace." We talked about that readiness of sharing the gospel. But if we keep reading, Paul connects that readiness to prayer. He goes on in verse 16. He says, "In all circumstances, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish the flaming darts of the evil one, take up the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit with all prayer and supplication. And to that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints." And then he says, "Pray also for me, that words may be given me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak." Paul's pleading with the early church to pray for him so that he can be faithful in this proclamation of the gospel. Paul believed in God's providence and his sovereignty in salvation, but that didn't stop him from acting, from working hard, from preaching, and from praying. Actually it compelled him to pray even more, to pray that God would open eyes, that God would open ears, that God would open doors that give him opportunities to share the gospel. Pray. Pray for people. Pray for people by name. Make a list. Pray for them privately. Pray for them with your community group. But we all have those people in our lives, we know who they are, and so pray for them. Pray before you preach. Number two, study hard and do your homework if you want to feel equipped, if you want to feel ready and prepared. We read this earlier. I'm going to read it again, 2 Timothy 3:14. Paul tells Timothy, "As for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you've been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete and equipped for every good work." If you want to feel more equipped to share the gospel, study scripture. If you want to be more ready to answer the questions and the objections that people might have about Christianity, you need to read the Bible, study the Bible. If you haven't done it, get yourself a nice ESV study Bible and just dig in. Learn the scriptures. If you need to, pick up some books on evangelism or apologetics. You can just go to our website. If you click on I think it's the connect and grow tab at the top, there's a little menu and there's a section there called Explore Christianity. It's a sermon series that Pastor Jan preached several years ago, but it's an awesome and it's a timeless series. He just goes through some of the most common objections and questions that people have about Christianity, to show that Christianity really is true and ways that we can defend our faith. If that's something you think that would be helpful, do it. Do your homework, study hard, prepare yourself, and most importantly, study God's word. Number three, don't go alone. Evangelism is a team sport. When you look at the life of Jesus Christ, almost everything he did, he did in community. You almost never see Jesus in a one-on-one situation. He's almost always surrounded by other people. Sometimes it's three, sometimes it's 12, sometimes it's more than that, but he's got a community of people around him. When he sends his disciples out, he doesn't send them out alone. He sends them out minimum two by two. When we read about Paul in his letters, he's traveling with an entourage, right? Everywhere he goes, he's got Timothy, he's got Silas, he's got all of these companions who are with him. Don't think that evangelism can only happen in one-on-one conversations. A lot of times it doesn't. A lot of times it's beneficial to do evangelism in more of a communal setting. Just purely practically, if you're going to hang out with a Christian friend, invite one of your non-Christian friends along. Or if you're going to hang out with a coworker, invite one of your Christian friends along. If your community group is getting together and have some kind of party or hang out, that might be a good time to invite a friend, a neighbor, a classmate, a coworker, someone who you might just want to spend that time with other Christians. You can love that person, witness to them together as a community. Don't go it alone. Number four, connect before you correct. When Paul was in Athens, he reasoned with the philosophers. He quoted their own poetry. He displayed knowledge of their culture. He connected with them. He met them where they were, and then he did his best to lead them to Christ. In homiletics, we call this contextualization, which is a big fancy word for just like don't be a weirdo. Be a relatable, normal person. Don't be the person who shows up in a three-piece suit with a briefcase full of charts and graphs and pulling everything out. Don't be the guy with the megaphone and the sandwich board telling people to turn or burn, get sanctified or chicken fried. Be a real person. I'm not saying don't talk about sin. I'm not saying don't talk about hell, don't talk about God's judgment. We need to talk about those things, and those things are real. What I'm saying is those things are real, we need to be real, right? We're just sinners saved by grace. We don't go into these conversations with pride, with self-righteousness. We don't approach people condescendingly. We speak the truth and we speak it boldly, but scripture says speak the truth in love. Be relatable. Show some emotional intelligence. Be humble. Be respectful. Be gentle. Show that you genuinely care about these people. That they're not just projects, that they're people, they're souls that we love, that we are concerned for. One just super easy practical way of doing this, if you find it hard or awkward to begin conversations about your faith or Jesus or Christianity, is before you dive into telling people what you think, just simply ask them what they think. Like, hey, do you have any kind of religious background? What do you think about the meaning of life? What do you think about Jesus Christ? People love to be asked questions. People love to talk about themselves. When they're done talking about themselves, more often than not, they're going to turn around and they're going to ask you the same questions. They've just given you the opportunity then to share the gospel and to tell them, "Well, this is what I think. This is what I believe. This is how Jesus saved me and changed my life." It's cliche, but it's true. People don't care what you know until they know that you care. Now, Paul put it like this in 1 Corinthians 9:19. He says, "For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win more Jews. To those under the law, I became as one under the law, though not myself being under the law, that I might win those under the law. To those outside the law, I became as one outside of the law, not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ, that I might win those outside of the law. To the weak, I became weak that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, so that what? So that I may share with them in its blessings." That's what it's all about. We have experienced the blessing of salvation, of a relationship with God the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ, and we want to share that blessing with others. Peter put it like this. 1 Peter 3:15 says, "In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and with respect." Connect before you correct. Number five, point people to Jesus. Peter said always be prepared right there. There's preparation involved. Be prepared to share the reason for your hope. I would encourage you at some point to write down your testimony and keep it up to date from time to time. But as you do, keep this in mind. If you read your testimony and your testimony is all about you, if you read your testimony and you come out looking like the hero, you probably did something wrong. That's probably not a testimony, that's more just a self-help book. You didn't save yourself. I didn't save myself. Your testimony should be focused on the one who did save you. Your testimony should be focused on what Jesus has done for you, not so much on what you have done for him. So that when you get the opportunity to share the reason for your hope, it becomes clear to everyone that the reason is Jesus. He's your living hope, that he is the hero of your story. That's really what we're doing in evangelism, right? Our job, help people see that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ. That Jesus is the hero of history. That Jesus is the hero of our story and help them to see that Jesus could be the hero of their story as well. Make sure that you're pointing people to Jesus. Number six, call for commitment. At some point, you have to make a call to action and make that clear for people. Faith comes by hearing the good news, but true and saving faith moves people to action. You have to talk about that. Talk about repentance and faith. Talk about baptism and the importance of getting plugged into a local church. Help them to see those next steps when they are ready to commit to following Jesus. If they're not ready, then number seven, the final tip, is just trust God with the growth. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3:6, "I planted, Apollos watered, but God's the one who gives the growth." At the end of the day, your job is not to save anyone. You can't do that. Your job is just to be faithfully there witnessing, planting, watering, praying, trusting God to bring the growth, trusting God to bring the harvest. All right, well, today is a special day. We are going to be celebrating communion together today. Communion is one more way that we as a community proclaim the gospel together. This is what Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 11:23. He says, "I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread. And when he had given thanks, he broke it, and he said, 'This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.' In the same way he took the cup after supper saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.' For, he says, as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes." The way that we celebrate communion here at Mosaic is hopefully as you came in, you're able grab one of these little cups. If not, feel free to just raise your hand right now. The ushers will be happy to bring one to you wherever you're sitting. Inside here, the bread represents, as we just read, the body of Christ. The cup represents his blood that was poured out so that we could be forgiven. This is a time for us to remember, to reflect, to celebrate the gospel of Jesus Christ. That we did not save ourselves, that we are sinners. And that because of our great sin, the only hope we could have of salvation is for Jesus Christ, the perfect spotless lamb of God, the Son of God, to come, to take on flesh and to give himself through his death on the cross, taking our place, taking the punishment that we deserved, paying that penalty, paying that debt that we could never afford to pay our own. That he did that for us, and that we can receive that by repenting and putting our faith in him as our Lord and Savior. That when we do that, we are forgiven. We are cleansed by his blood. We read this earlier, that he became sins so that we might become the righteousness of God. That our sin is accounted to Jesus. He pays for that on the cross and his righteousness is accredited to us. We are now able to stand before the Father cleansed, holy, righteous because of what Christ has done for us. That is what we remember, that's what we celebrate, and that's what we give thanks to God for right now. If you're here today and you are a Christian, we would welcome you to celebrate communion with us right now as we partake of the elements together. If you're not a Christian, or if you are a Christian who is living an unrepentant sin, we would ask you to refrain from this part of the service. It's not going to do anything for you. There's nothing magical about this, apart from faith in Jesus Christ and walking in repentance for Jesus Christ. Scripture actually warns us and Paul continues in the very next verse, verse 27 of 1 Corinthians 11. He says, "Whoever therefore eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Therefore, let a person examine himself then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself." If that is you, as we would say, refrain from this. Better would be to spend this time right now to repent, confess to God, and he will be faithful and just to forgive you. If you've done that today, if you have given your life to Christ and made that commitment today, or if you are a Christian walking in repentance and faith, we would invite you to join us now as we celebrate communion together. Let's pray and then we will move. God, we thank you for this great hope that we have, this living hope that we have through Jesus Christ, our risen Lord and Savior. We thank you for the many blessings that we have, for the abundant life that we have in Christ as we follow Him, our good shepherd. Lord, I pray that you would give us a joy and a burden and an urgency and excitement to share this good news with others, to share in this blessing with those that you've placed into our lives. I pray that you would open people's hearts, that you would open doors of opportunity for us in those moments, that you would give us grace, that your Holy Spirit would speak through us to be faithful witnesses to you and to all that you have done wherever we have opportunity to do so, Lord. I pray that in doing so, that you would continue to draw many to yourself and add to our number day by day those who are being saved. All of this is possible only because of the blood of Jesus Christ. Jesus, we thank you for the cross. We thank you for your sacrifice, for the amazing love and grace that you have poured out on us. We didn't deserve it, but we worship you and we thank you for extending it to us. I pray that you would bless our time of communion right now. In Jesus' name, amen.

Mosaic Boston
Commit To Evangelism

Mosaic Boston

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 5, 2023 52:28


Audio Transcript:This media has been made available by Mosaic BostonChurch. If you'd like to check out more resources, learn about Mosaic Boston,or donate to this ministry, please visit mosaicboston.com. If you have your Bibles, go ahead and open up to Matthew 28. We are in week three of our sermon series Committed. We've been talking about the essential habits of an abundant life in Christ, and what I've been saying over these last couple of weeks is we're taking this time to focus on some of the essential, non-negotiable, super practical commitments that every Christian must make in order to grow in their faith, in order to persevere through trials, in order to fulfill God's purpose and calling for their life, and in order to experience and to enjoy this abundant life that Jesus Christ came to give us. Two weeks ago, we started off by talking about the commitment to follow Jesus as our Lord, as our savior, as our good shepherd. Last week we talked about committing to a local church and the importance of having a church, having fellowship with other believers to support us, encourage us, and hold us accountable as we follow Jesus. This week we're going to talk about evangelism. Our sermon is called Commit to Evangelism. At the end of last week's passage in Acts 2, verse 47 tells us that the early church, these early Christians were praising God and having favor with all of the people, and the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved. If you're here last week, you remember we talked about how these early Christians were committed. They were devoted to sharing their lives with one another sacrificially. They were deeply committed to one another and the church. But this doesn't mean that they were just a holy huddle of the frozen chosen as we joke about some churches being today. They were a church on a mission. We talked a little bit about how the church can be thought of in the metaphor of a ship. That we as a church, we're not trying to be a cruise ship, we're trying to be a battleship. On a cruise ship, everyone shows up and everyone shows up to be served and to be entertained. You float around in circles. You wind up right back where you started. On a battleship, everyone shows up to serve. Everyone shows up because we're all working together with same purpose, same mission, and we're going to be spending these next two weeks talking about what that mission is, focusing on what has come to be called the Great Commission and two aspects of that Great Commission. If you're not familiar with the Great Commission, this is basically Jesus' final marching orders to the church, his final instructions that he leaves before ascending to the right hand of the Father in heaven. We can find it in Matthew 28. This is where we're going to be begin our time today, Matthew 28 beginning in verse 28. This is what it says. It says that Jesus came to them, came to his disciples, and he said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." You see the two aspects of this mission, right? First of all, there's this outward mission. Jesus says, "You need to go into all the world and make disciples." That's evangelism. That's what we're going to be talking about today. The second aspect of the mission is more inward where Jesus says, "And then you need to teach them to observe all that I have commanded you to do." That's discipleship. We'll be talking more about that next week. Discipleship is focused on the mission of sanctification. Evangelism is focused on the mission of conversion. Already, hopefully, I wouldn't be surprised if everyone's feeling a little bit uncomfortable. I'm surprised. After last week telling you we were going to talk about evangelism today, I'm like, good to see that some of you came back, because this is not something that we get particularly comfortable with thinking about converting people, proselytizing, things like that. They're not popular concepts in our culture. I don't know if I would use the word proselytizing, but we are going to talk about we do want to convert people to Christianity. We want to persuade people to believe and to follow Jesus Christ. I remember the first time that I ever visited Boston. We were downtown doing kind of the touristy thing. My wife and I were there. Our son Owen, he was about nine months old at the time. We're walking around in the Boston Commons and we're making our way toward Park Street Station. There's these two younger girls behind us having a very loud, very passionate discussion. One of them was pleading passionately with her friend trying to warn her to never read anything by this author that she discovered named C.S. Lewis and to never read the book The Chronicles of Narnia because she had found out that this guy was actually a Christian and he was secretly trying to convert people with his books. If you know anything about C.S. Lewis, there wasn't anything secret about it. He's pretty on the nose about everything that he wrote. He was overtly a Christian. Chronicles of Narnia, it's a straight-up allegory of Christianity. He wasn't trying to hide any of that. But what stuck out to me about that conversation was as I'm listening to these girls have their discussion, really what she was doing was she was trying to convert her friend. She was trying to convert her friend to this position of non-conversion. Providentially, the next morning we got up and we visited Mosaic for the first time and Pastor Jan was preaching on that exact topic, on this idea of the world trying to convert people to this position of non-conversion. This girl was hypocritically doing the very thing that she was condemning someone else, C.S. Lewis in this case, of doing. The question then is, why are we then so afraid to do that ourselves as Christians? Non-Christians do it all the time. People in general do it all the time. If you believe that something is true and if you believe that that truth matters, well, then it's only natural that you're going to try to persuade other people to accept it and to believe it as well, even if the truth is inconvenient, even if the truth is uncomfortable. Love would compel you to plead with others to accept it and believe it. A good doctor wouldn't hide the truth from their patient. A good doctor will share their diagnosis and prescription even if that truth is not necessarily what the patient wants to hear, because withholding that would be unloving. It would be unprofessional. It could be deadly. I think part of the reason that many Christians are afraid to share their faith is that we have this fear of rejection. I've shared the gospel with several people in Boston, and more often than not, that's been met with rejection. Every single time it's uncomfortable. But what my experiences taught me is that even though in sharing the gospel, yeah, I have faced a lot of rejection, it usually doesn't come as the form that I'm afraid of. It usually doesn't come in the form of anger or hostility. It's usually just kind of more of a Stoic response of like, "Oh, that's interesting or that's nice. I'm glad that that worked for you, but not really something I'm interested in myself." It's not the response that I hoped for, but it's also really not a response that should cause us to be afraid to share the gospel in the first place. I say that just to say don't be anxious, don't catastrophize what might possibly happen when you share the gospel because you really don't know. You don't know how they're going to respond. You can't control how they're going to respond. You might be surprised to discover that a lot of people are more open and more comfortable to talking about these things than you might assume. Sometimes we are reluctant to share the gospel out of fear of rejection. I think most Christians, however, are reluctant to share the gospel out of a fear of failure. I think a lot of Christians, maybe they want to share the gospel, they have a desire, they know that it's something they ought to do, but they're worried about failure because they don't feel equipped. What if they ask me a question I don't know how to answer? What if I say something wrong? We can't control how people are going to respond to the message, but there are things that we can do to prepare ourselves and to be equipped to share that message more effectively when we have opportunities to do so. That's really what I want to spend our time focusing more on today. Toward the end of our time this morning, I'm going to share just some rapid fire practical tips for evangelism. But to begin with, I want us to just start by looking at three biblical truths, three realities, three things that Jesus equips us with in order to help us overcome this fear of sharing the gospel. If you have your Bibles, we're going to be launching out of Matthew 28, but we're going to be doing a survey of many scriptures that will help us understand these things. Before we begin, let's pray and then we'll jump into the message together. Jesus, you told your disciples that they should pray to the Lord of the harvest, that the harvest is great, but the workers are few. Pray to the Lord of the harvest to raise up more workers for this mission. Lord, we pray that you would do that. Even right now, Lord, I pray that you would be doing that. Lord, we know that immediately after instructing his disciples to pray, he then sends them out to do the very thing, to be the answer to their very own prayers and to go and to preach the gospel. Lord, I pray that you would help us today to see that you have saved us in order to send us. That you have called us, you have commissioned us, and you have equipped us. That you do not send us out alone, you do not send us out, but you send us out fully equipped to do what you have called to do. That you have given us the authority of your word. You've given us the presence and the power of your Holy Spirit. You've given us the fellowship of the church. We have everything we need to accomplish this mission together. Lord, I pray that you would give us grace to do so. God, we pray right now that you just bless our time and your holy word this morning. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, well, the first truth, the first reality that I want us to look at, that we need to understand and believe that's going to help us overcome our fear of sharing the gospel is this, that Jesus equips us and he sends us with both the clarity and the authority of his word. That Jesus doesn't send us out with a long list of complicated religious rights and rituals and rules. We sang this earlier, that it's finished, it is accomplished. There's no work that we can do to further this mission that the message of the mission is very simple. It's so simple that it can be summed up here in just a couple of sentences. It's so deep, it's so sophisticated that you can spend the rest of your life devoting yourself to it and never master it. There's always room to grow. You can spend the rest of your life studying scripture, growing and maturing in the Holy Spirit. What is the mission? There's a story in the Gospel of Matthew where a religious leader, a teacher of the religious law comes up to Jesus and he wants to know, he wants to ask him, "Jesus, what is the greatest of all of the commandments?" In Matthew 22:37, Jesus said to him, he said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all of your soul and with all of your mind. This is the great and the first commandment. And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depends all the law and the prophets." All the Old Testament, the law, the prophets, they're all summed up on these two things, to love God with everything and to love your neighbor as yourself. The mission of the church is simply this, the Great Commission is to simply live that out and then to teach others to do the same. Repent of your sin. Put your faith in Jesus Christ. Commit to follow him, to obey him, to observe all that he has commanded. To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself and then to teach others to do the same. The mission is simple, the mission is clear, but that doesn't mean that it's easy. Following Jesus is going to be hard. Taking this message to the ends of the earth is going to be hard. Just taking this message across the hallway, across the street, across the cubicle is going to be hard. We need to understand that Jesus doesn't merely send us out with a clear mission, he also sends us out with clear authority. I think one of the best explanations of these two realities coming together can be seen in 2 Corinthians 5:17-21. The apostle Paul says this, he says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed, and behold, the new has come. All of this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you and on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God. For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." It's very clear the message, that Jesus Christ became sin for us. He took our sin upon himself on the cross. He paid the penalty that we deserve so that we could become the righteousness of God, so that we could be forgiven, reconciled to God through this ministry of reconciliation. That's the message. The mission is then to go with this message and to reconcile people to God. The authority then is that we are not going out alone. We're not going out in our own authority. We are going out sent by the king, sent as ambassadors of Christ for proclaiming this good news about his kingdom. All that to say is don't make the mission overly complicated. Evangelism simply means to announce the good news that Jesus is king. Human beings are sinners. Jesus is the savior. He is Lord, he is king, and he has now sent us as his ambassadors of his kingdom, sent us to warn the world that he is going to come again to judge the world in righteousness, but also sent to proclaim this good news that the king is coming right now. He's offering amnesty that right now this king has made a way to reconcile the world to himself. He is offering terms of peace for all who would repent, believe, for all who would lay down their arms and surrender, commit their allegiance to him as the good and the rightful king that he is. C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, he put it like this. He said, "Enemy occupied territory, that is what this world is. Christianity is the story of how the rightful king has landed, and you might say landed in disguise, and is calling us to take part of a great campaign of sabotage." We're going out as ambassadors on this rescue mission, recruiting people to the kingdom of God. Sharing the gospel is intimidating because it's intimidating to go and to walk into enemy occupied territory. But we do this with a clear mission, with a clear message, and with a clear authority of knowing that we have been sent by the true, the good, the rightful king. When you're feeling fearful about sharing your faith, remember this, that every time that you speak the words of scripture and share God's word, every time that you proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, that Jesus is not just with you, but as this text just said, he's actually making his appeal through you, calling people to himself to be reconciled, to make peace through his bloodshed on the cross. 2 Timothy 3:14-17 tells us that, "All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching and for reproof, for correction, and for training and righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." Every good work that we'll ever be called to do. Scripture equips us for all of that. The first step to overcoming our fear is to know God's word, to know that his word is authoritative and true. It is living and active. It equips us for every good work, and so that we shouldn't be ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ because we know it is the power of God unto salvation. Point number two, Jesus sends us out with the clarity and the authority of his word. He also sends us out with the courageous readiness of knowing and of resting in his sovereignty. Ephesians 6:14, Paul tells us to, "Stand firm, therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace." That God's sovereignty and salvation should replace our fear with this incredible courage and a readiness to share the gospel. Because when you think about this, what does this mean, God's sovereignty? It means that he has the power to save anyone, anytime, anywhere, even the people that we least expect. Nobody knew this better than the apostle Paul himself, right? I mean, this was the guy who was a violent persecutor of the church. No one ever expected this guy to get saved. He hated Christians. He had made it his mission to snuff out the Christian movement wherever he could find it, and yet Jesus finds him. Jesus saves him. Jesus gave him a new mission and turns him into the greatest missionary that the church has ever seen. Paul knew that if Jesus could save him, well, Jesus could save anyone. Why should he be afraid? Why should he be fearful of sharing this good news with anyone wherever he goes, no matter what opposition, no matter what persecution he often faced. Consider the life of Paul with me for a moment. Just going to take a look at an episode of his life from the Book of Acts. In Acts 14, Paul is preaching the gospel in Lystra. As he's there, as he's preaching a gospel, this angry mob shows up, drags him out of town, stones him, leaves him for dead. Do you remember what it says what Paul does after he eventually wakes up not dead? It seems like you can go down a whole rabbit trail on this. Reading the Book of Galatians, Paul kind of eludes like maybe he actually died. He has this out of body experience, and then he comes back. We don't know. But he's stoned and left for dead. He wakes up eventually. He regains consciousness. And what does he do? He gets back up and he goes back into the town where the people just mobbed him, dragged him out, and stoned him and left him for dead. Incredible courage and boldness. He then leaves. He makes his way onto Philippi. In Philippi, he gets arrested again. He's beaten with rods. After that, it goes to Thessaloniki. Again, angry mob in Thessaloniki. Escapes by night to Berea where he's faced with yet another angry mob of people. He goes through Athens, makes his way to Corinth. And once again, we're told that he was met with those people who opposed and reviled him. I don't know about you, by this point, I'd be feeling a little bit discouraged. Mob me once, shame on you. Mob me 17, 18, 19 times, I must be doing something wrong. I should go take a class on evangelism or something. I don't know. What keeps Paul going? What kept him going was his belief in the sovereignty of God. That despite all the opposition that he faced, all the persecution that he experienced, that in each of these cities, people were getting saved, churches were being planted, lives were being transformed, legacies were being built. In the midst of all of this, in Acts 17, when Paul is in Corinth, God came to him in a vision during the night. In Acts 17:9-11, it says this that the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision. He said, "Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent, for I am with you and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people." He stayed there a year and six months teaching the word of God among them. Paul understood that there would be many in this city who would oppose and revile him, and yet he would go on preaching the gospel because he also knew that there were many of God's elect, many of God's people here as well. His job was to preach the word. No gimmicks. No tricks. Preach the word, trust the word to do its work, trust God to draw his people to himself. That's what happened. Trust that Jesus' sheep would hear his voice and follow him. Right before getting to Corinth, Paul was in Athens. In Athens, he met with the philosophers at the Areopagus on Mars Hill. As he meets with them, he's walking through their temples. He's observing all of their idols that they've made to their many gods, and he gets to have this conversation with them. This is what he tells them in verse 26. He tells them that God made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth and determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place. That God determined where, when every person would live. So that what? Verse 27, so that they should seek God, perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he's actually not far from each of us. For in him we live and move and have our being, even as some of your own poets have said, "For indeed we are his offspring." Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of men. The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man, Jesus Christ, whom he appointed, and of this he's given full assurance to all by raising him from the dead. See, I don't think that Paul believed in coincidence. I think Paul believed in providence, and this is what gave him this courageous readiness to share the gospel no matter where he was, no matter what kind of opposition that he was facing, because he knew that God was sovereign. I think one of my favorite examples of this is when he writes to the church in Philippi. At the end of Paul's letter to the Philippians, he's sending his greetings and he tells them in Philippians 4:22, he says, "All the saints send their greetings," then he adds this little comment, "especially those of Caesar's household." At the time, Paul was in chains. He was in prison, maybe under house arrest, and he's chained to these guards from Caesar's household all day. What does he do? He doesn't get discouraged. He doesn't quit. He doesn't say, "Well, I'm here/ I'm locked up. There's nothing I can do." He says, "Well, if I'm here and I'm locked up and I'm chained to these guards, it must be because I need to share the gospel with them. You think that Lord Caesar has me chained to you? Well, I think that Lord Jesus has you chained to me, and so now you're going to hear the gospel." He begins sharing the gospel with these guards and they end up getting saved. He's just kind of showing how God is flexing here. He's like, "Oh, and by the way, the people in Caesar's household, they send you their greetings that they are now believers, that they are now following Jesus as well." If God puts people in your life, if God gives you opportunities to share the gospel, perhaps that's not a coincidence. As Paul told the philosophers, God's providence determines the allotted periods and boundaries. Perhaps he's placed you in these people's lives for a reason. We all know this. When you go to school or when you go to work or when you go home and you're amongst your neighbors, that chances are if you are a Christian living in Boston, Massachusetts, you are quite probably the only Christian that any of these people know in the city. Maybe there's a reason that God has put you in their lives. You can't save anyone. That's not your job, right? That's Jesus' department is salvation. Your job is to be a faithful witness wherever he's placed you, to scatter the seed to pray and to trust God, to bring the growth, to bring the harvest. Trust God with the results. And with this, if you don't see those results right away, don't let that discourage you either. It doesn't mean that you did something wrong. It also doesn't mean that nothing is happening. We can't always see what God is doing beneath the surface when we share the gospel with people. Just an example from my own life, I've shared this before. In a former life as a young college student in the early 2000s, I was in a pop punk band. That was a thing at the time. We were in the Midwest. You had the West Coast punk. You had the East Coast punk. We were trying to pioneer the Midwest Coast punk. What that meant was we would go to class during the week. And then on the weekends, we would load up our big white conversion van and we would hit the road. We'd drive all over the Midwest playing shows in different towns and cities, and we got to spend a lot of time just driving around on the road, having conversations with one another as members of the band. At the time, none of the other members of the band were Christians. I shared last week that I had grown up in the church, but I wasn't walking with the Lord at this time. I don't really think that I was even yet a Christian at this time. But one night, it's late at night, we're on the road and we get into this conversation about faith and Jesus and Christianity. For whatever reason, I find myself defending the faith to our bass player and our drummer, trying to convince them that Christianity is true, that Jesus really is God, that he really did fulfill all of these prophecies, and he rose from the dead. We're having this, we're going back and forth. Eventually at one point, the bass player just shut the conversation down. Not in a mean way, but just kind of like a joking like, "I don't want to talk about this. I'm getting uncomfortable kind of way." We changed the subject, moved on, and honestly didn't think about that conversation again for a really long time. Fast-forward several years, we'd split up. We'd all grown up and went out and got real jobs and still in touch, but weren't living near each other, hadn't really talked to each other for a long time. I get a phone call one day from one of the guys in the band. It wasn't the bass player or the drummer. Actually for a brief time, there was a fourth guy in our band. He was only in the band for a few months after I joined, and then he quit. I really hadn't heard or seen from him again. He called me up because he wanted to tell me that he had become a Christian. He remembered that I had grown up going to church and I was a Christian. He wanted to let me know, "I'm a Christian now. I'm leading worship in my church." He was all excited. He was all on fire. He's like, "And I want you to know that this all started for me way back because of that conversation in the van." I was like, "You weren't even part of that conversation in the van." Actually, he was sitting in the back. I thought he was asleep the whole time, and apparently he'd been paying attention and somehow some seeds had gotten planted in him that eventually led to him becoming a Christian. He's still a Christian today. He's working in ministry today, and God's doing awesome things through his life. But I share all that just to say, you never know what God does with the gospel after you've shared it with somebody. Even if you don't see those results right away, it doesn't mean that God's not doing something. Don't get discouraged. Don't lose heart. Just be faithful and continue and persevere. Jesus equips us. He sends us with clarity and authority of his word, with the courageous readiness of his sovereignty, and number three, with the comforting power of his presence. I'm going to read several passages for us, because this is really important. First one is John 14:16-18. Jesus tells his disciples, he says, "I will ask the Father and he will give you another helper to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him or knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you.: In Luke 24:26, he said to them, "Thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon. You, but stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high." Acts 1:8, Jesus again tells his disciples, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." In our passage today, he says, "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." Something happened on the day of Pentecost that we read about in Acts 2 a couple weeks ago. Something happened that day that had never happened before in the history of mankind. Before Christ in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit would come upon people for a time and for a task. But now what we see is that from now on, all of those who are in Christ, that the Holy Spirit is poured out, that the Holy Spirit dwells in us each personally and permanently. Jesus, he promised in the Great Commission, he said, "I will be with you always to the very end of the age." Obviously he's not here with us physically right now, but that's not what he was talking about. He's alluding to the gift of the Holy Spirit that he was going to pour out on his church after ascending into heaven. Jesus, he talked about this in John 16. In John 16, Jesus was talking with his disciples and he tells him this in verse five. He says, "Now I am going to him who sent me and none of you asks me, where are you going?" He said, "I'm preparing to go back to ascend to the right hand of my father. But because of I've said these things to you, sorrow has filled your hearts," which is understandable, right? You just got to spend three years in the presence of Jesus Christ physically. That would be sad to think about him leaving and ascending back to heaven. But verse seven, Jesus tells them, "Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it's to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you." I don't know if we can really grasp what a big deal that is. Jesus is literally saying what we have right now as believers, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is in some ways to our advantage that it's actually in some ways we are better off right now than if he had remained physically here with us in the flesh. That when Jesus Christ took on flesh, that he in some sense allowed his presence to be confined by time and space in a human body. But when he ascended into heaven, he poured out the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Holy Spirit of the living God upon every member of his church. That the Holy Spirit is indwelling in all Christians, in all places at all times for all times. If you are in Christ, what this means is that Christ is not just with you, he is in you. You have been clothed with power from high, scripture says. You have been filled with the Holy Spirit of God, that God is with you and for you. He will not leave you or forsake you. He's working all things together for you, working for you and in you and through you, so you can have courage. You don't need to fear. That wherever you go, you go with the comforting power of the presence of Jesus Christ with you. Paul in Ephesians 3, he just writes this amazing passage. He says, "For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven on earth is named. That according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Holy Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. That you, being rooted and grounded in love, may strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." He says, "And now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever, amen." It's too much to wrap your mind around. God is with us, that he is for us, that he is able to do abundantly more than we could ask or even imagine or hope to think. Set your minds on these things. If you're feeling fearful, if you're feeling discouraged, before you go and preach to others, preach to yourself. Remind your heart, your soul, your mind that God is sovereign, that God is faithful, that Christ is with you. He is in. He wants his spirit and his power to work through you. All right, well, I said at the beginning that I'd give you some practical tips here at the end, some just practical steps for evangelism. We don't have a lot of time, so I'm going to go through these pretty fast. Someone told me last week that my sermon had a lot of bullet points. I've only given you three this far, so I'm going to give you seven more. We're going to go really quick. This is another machine gun sermon. We're going like rapid fire through these last seven here at the end, but super practical, just seven tips for sharing your faith. First and foremost, you need to pray before you preach. We read in Ephesians, Paul said, "Stand therefore having fastened on the belt of truth and having put on the breastplate of righteousness. And as for shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace." We talked about that readiness of sharing the gospel. But if we keep reading, Paul connects that readiness to prayer. He goes on in verse 16. He says, "In all circumstances, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish the flaming darts of the evil one, take up the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit with all prayer and supplication. And to that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints." And then he says, "Pray also for me, that words may be given me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak." Paul's pleading with the early church to pray for him so that he can be faithful in this proclamation of the gospel. Paul believed in God's providence and his sovereignty in salvation, but that didn't stop him from acting, from working hard, from preaching, and from praying. Actually it compelled him to pray even more, to pray that God would open eyes, that God would open ears, that God would open doors that give him opportunities to share the gospel. Pray. Pray for people. Pray for people by name. Make a list. Pray for them privately. Pray for them with your community group. But we all have those people in our lives, we know who they are, and so pray for them. Pray before you preach. Number two, study hard and do your homework if you want to feel equipped, if you want to feel ready and prepared. We read this earlier. I'm going to read it again, 2 Timothy 3:14. Paul tells Timothy, "As for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you've been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete and equipped for every good work." If you want to feel more equipped to share the gospel, study scripture. If you want to be more ready to answer the questions and the objections that people might have about Christianity, you need to read the Bible, study the Bible. If you haven't done it, get yourself a nice ESV study Bible and just dig in. Learn the scriptures. If you need to, pick up some books on evangelism or apologetics. You can just go to our website. If you click on I think it's the connect and grow tab at the top, there's a little menu and there's a section there called Explore Christianity. It's a sermon series that Pastor Jan preached several years ago, but it's an awesome and it's a timeless series. He just goes through some of the most common objections and questions that people have about Christianity, to show that Christianity really is true and ways that we can defend our faith. If that's something you think that would be helpful, do it. Do your homework, study hard, prepare yourself, and most importantly, study God's word. Number three, don't go alone. Evangelism is a team sport. When you look at the life of Jesus Christ, almost everything he did, he did in community. You almost never see Jesus in a one-on-one situation. He's almost always surrounded by other people. Sometimes it's three, sometimes it's 12, sometimes it's more than that, but he's got a community of people around him. When he sends his disciples out, he doesn't send them out alone. He sends them out minimum two by two. When we read about Paul in his letters, he's traveling with an entourage, right? Everywhere he goes, he's got Timothy, he's got Silas, he's got all of these companions who are with him. Don't think that evangelism can only happen in one-on-one conversations. A lot of times it doesn't. A lot of times it's beneficial to do evangelism in more of a communal setting. Just purely practically, if you're going to hang out with a Christian friend, invite one of your non-Christian friends along. Or if you're going to hang out with a coworker, invite one of your Christian friends along. If your community group is getting together and have some kind of party or hang out, that might be a good time to invite a friend, a neighbor, a classmate, a coworker, someone who you might just want to spend that time with other Christians. You can love that person, witness to them together as a community. Don't go it alone. Number four, connect before you correct. When Paul was in Athens, he reasoned with the philosophers. He quoted their own poetry. He displayed knowledge of their culture. He connected with them. He met them where they were, and then he did his best to lead them to Christ. In homiletics, we call this contextualization, which is a big fancy word for just like don't be a weirdo. Be a relatable, normal person. Don't be the person who shows up in a three-piece suit with a briefcase full of charts and graphs and pulling everything out. Don't be the guy with the megaphone and the sandwich board telling people to turn or burn, get sanctified or chicken fried. Be a real person. I'm not saying don't talk about sin. I'm not saying don't talk about hell, don't talk about God's judgment. We need to talk about those things, and those things are real. What I'm saying is those things are real, we need to be real, right? We're just sinners saved by grace. We don't go into these conversations with pride, with self-righteousness. We don't approach people condescendingly. We speak the truth and we speak it boldly, but scripture says speak the truth in love. Be relatable. Show some emotional intelligence. Be humble. Be respectful. Be gentle. Show that you genuinely care about these people. That they're not just projects, that they're people, they're souls that we love, that we are concerned for. One just super easy practical way of doing this, if you find it hard or awkward to begin conversations about your faith or Jesus or Christianity, is before you dive into telling people what you think, just simply ask them what they think. Like, hey, do you have any kind of religious background? What do you think about the meaning of life? What do you think about Jesus Christ? People love to be asked questions. People love to talk about themselves. When they're done talking about themselves, more often than not, they're going to turn around and they're going to ask you the same questions. They've just given you the opportunity then to share the gospel and to tell them, "Well, this is what I think. This is what I believe. This is how Jesus saved me and changed my life." It's cliche, but it's true. People don't care what you know until they know that you care. Now, Paul put it like this in 1 Corinthians 9:19. He says, "For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win more Jews. To those under the law, I became as one under the law, though not myself being under the law, that I might win those under the law. To those outside the law, I became as one outside of the law, not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ, that I might win those outside of the law. To the weak, I became weak that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, so that what? So that I may share with them in its blessings." That's what it's all about. We have experienced the blessing of salvation, of a relationship with God the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ, and we want to share that blessing with others. Peter put it like this. 1 Peter 3:15 says, "In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and with respect." Connect before you correct. Number five, point people to Jesus. Peter said always be prepared right there. There's preparation involved. Be prepared to share the reason for your hope. I would encourage you at some point to write down your testimony and keep it up to date from time to time. But as you do, keep this in mind. If you read your testimony and your testimony is all about you, if you read your testimony and you come out looking like the hero, you probably did something wrong. That's probably not a testimony, that's more just a self-help book. You didn't save yourself. I didn't save myself. Your testimony should be focused on the one who did save you. Your testimony should be focused on what Jesus has done for you, not so much on what you have done for him. So that when you get the opportunity to share the reason for your hope, it becomes clear to everyone that the reason is Jesus. He's your living hope, that he is the hero of your story. That's really what we're doing in evangelism, right? Our job, help people see that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ. That Jesus is the hero of history. That Jesus is the hero of our story and help them to see that Jesus could be the hero of their story as well. Make sure that you're pointing people to Jesus. Number six, call for commitment. At some point, you have to make a call to action and make that clear for people. Faith comes by hearing the good news, but true and saving faith moves people to action. You have to talk about that. Talk about repentance and faith. Talk about baptism and the importance of getting plugged into a local church. Help them to see those next steps when they are ready to commit to following Jesus. If they're not ready, then number seven, the final tip, is just trust God with the growth. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3:6, "I planted, Apollos watered, but God's the one who gives the growth." At the end of the day, your job is not to save anyone. You can't do that. Your job is just to be faithfully there witnessing, planting, watering, praying, trusting God to bring the growth, trusting God to bring the harvest. All right, well, today is a special day. We are going to be celebrating communion together today. Communion is one more way that we as a community proclaim the gospel together. This is what Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 11:23. He says, "I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread. And when he had given thanks, he broke it, and he said, 'This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.' In the same way he took the cup after supper saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.' For, he says, as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes." The way that we celebrate communion here at Mosaic is hopefully as you came in, you're able grab one of these little cups. If not, feel free to just raise your hand right now. The ushers will be happy to bring one to you wherever you're sitting. Inside here, the bread represents, as we just read, the body of Christ. The cup represents his blood that was poured out so that we could be forgiven. This is a time for us to remember, to reflect, to celebrate the gospel of Jesus Christ. That we did not save ourselves, that we are sinners. And that because of our great sin, the only hope we could have of salvation is for Jesus Christ, the perfect spotless lamb of God, the Son of God, to come, to take on flesh and to give himself through his death on the cross, taking our place, taking the punishment that we deserved, paying that penalty, paying that debt that we could never afford to pay our own. That he did that for us, and that we can receive that by repenting and putting our faith in him as our Lord and Savior. That when we do that, we are forgiven. We are cleansed by his blood. We read this earlier, that he became sins so that we might become the righteousness of God. That our sin is accounted to Jesus. He pays for that on the cross and his righteousness is accredited to us. We are now able to stand before the Father cleansed, holy, righteous because of what Christ has done for us. That is what we remember, that's what we celebrate, and that's what we give thanks to God for right now. If you're here today and you are a Christian, we would welcome you to celebrate communion with us right now as we partake of the elements together. If you're not a Christian, or if you are a Christian who is living an unrepentant sin, we would ask you to refrain from this part of the service. It's not going to do anything for you. There's nothing magical about this, apart from faith in Jesus Christ and walking in repentance for Jesus Christ. Scripture actually warns us and Paul continues in the very next verse, verse 27 of 1 Corinthians 11. He says, "Whoever therefore eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Therefore, let a person examine himself then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself." If that is you, as we would say, refrain from this. Better would be to spend this time right now to repent, confess to God, and he will be faithful and just to forgive you. If you've done that today, if you have given your life to Christ and made that commitment today, or if you are a Christian walking in repentance and faith, we would invite you to join us now as we celebrate communion together. Let's pray and then we will move. God, we thank you for this great hope that we have, this living hope that we have through Jesus Christ, our risen Lord and Savior. We thank you for the many blessings that we have, for the abundant life that we have in Christ as we follow Him, our good shepherd. Lord, I pray that you would give us a joy and a burden and an urgency and excitement to share this good news with others, to share in this blessing with those that you've placed into our lives. I pray that you would open people's hearts, that you would open doors of opportunity for us in those moments, that you would give us grace, that your Holy Spirit would speak through us to be faithful witnesses to you and to all that you have done wherever we have opportunity to do so, Lord. I pray that in doing so, that you would continue to draw many to yourself and add to our number day by day those who are being saved. All of this is possible only because of the blood of Jesus Christ. Jesus, we thank you for the cross. We thank you for your sacrifice, for the amazing love and grace that you have poured out on us. We didn't deserve it, but we worship you and we thank you for extending it to us. I pray that you would bless our time of communion right now. In Jesus' name, amen.