Podcasts about here jesus

What can we learn about Satan, demons, and the victory of Christ from Christ's own words in this passage? Here Jesus equips us not only to know the danger of our enemy, but also the power of our Deliverer. This message was preached by Pastor Erick Cobb on July 20, 2025.

Jesus' Last Night Right mouse click here to download as a MP3 audio file G'day and welcome to Partake! We are now on day 21 of our series "Glimpses", looking at the story of the Bible in 30 days, from the time of creation through to the time of the fullness of redemption! Last time we looked at Jesus at prayer. Today we look at the events of his last night, before his death. In Luke 22, we come to Jesus' last night before He goes to death on the cross. It's the time for the Feast of Passover! Jerusalem was filled with people come to celebrate this great event! Passover was a time to commemorate the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, and it was a time for remembering and rejoicing with families (Exodus 11-12). 1. Plans of His enemies In Luke 22v1-6, we read that Jesus' enemies plotted to kill him (Luke 22v2) and arranged for Judas to betray him (Luke 22v3). Of course, satan is involved, just as he was at the beginning of time and his purpose was to destroy Jesus (Luke 22v3, Luke 22v31). What about Judas though? Judas was motivated by greed, energized by satan and willing to betray Jesus for money (John 13v2, 27). Judas was never a true believer because his sins had never been cleansed by the Lord (John 13v10-11), therefore he had never truly believed or received eternal life (John 6v64-71). And while all this is going on, Jesus is still in perfect control. All the elements in the plot conspiring against Jesus had been allowed for. Remember, Jesus had been talking to God the Father! The death of Jesus was no accident! 2. Jesus Plans In accordance with the Mosaic covenant, the people of Israel were expected to remove all yeast from their houses (Ex.12v15) as a reminder that their ancestors left Egypt in a hurry and had to eat bread without yeast on their travels to the promised land. In Luke 12v1, Jesus had warned his disciples about the "yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy". In other words, the religious leaders had cleansed their houses but not their hearts. The last thing the religious leaders wanted was a messianic uprising during Passover (Luke 19v11). They would have heard the crowds talking up Jesus Christ as the messiah, particularly after the events of the previous week when Jesus entered Jerusalem!. 3. Jesus Prepares (Luke 22v7-23) Reading Luke 22v7, 13 - Now the Festival of Unleavened Bread arrived, when the Passover lamb is sacrificed. Jesus sent Peter and John ahead and said, "Go and prepare the Passover meal, so we can eat it together." The disciples went off to the city and found everything just as Jesus had said, and they prepared the Passover meal there. Disciples needed a room within Jerusalem itself, and also required food - a lamb, bread, bitter herbs and wine. 4. Jesus initiates the New Covenant (Luke 22v14-23) - When the time came, Jesus and the apostles sat down together at the table. Jesus said, "I have been very eager to eat this Passover meal with you before my suffering begins. For I tell you now that I won't eat this meal again until its meaning is fulfilled in the Kingdom of God." Then he took a cup of wine and gave thanks to God for it. Then he said, "Take this and share it among yourselves. For I will not drink wine again until the Kingdom of God has come." He took some bread and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and gave it to the disciples, saying, "This is my body, which is given for you. Do this to remember me." After supper he took another cup of wine and said, "This cup is the new covenant between God and his people-an agreement confirmed with my blood, which is poured out as a sacrifice for you. The Passover meal contains historical and theological symbolism regarding the death of Jesus. We will come to see what those are later on in the series, but suffice to say at this point, it is why this meal is the model for the central act of Christian worship, which is Holy Communion. Opening Prayer First cup of wine and a dish of herbs and sauce. Story of the Passover was recited. Psalm 113 was sung Second cup of wine Prayer of Grace Main course of roast lamb with unleavened bread and bitter herbs A further prayer Third cup of wine. Psalm 114 to 118 were then sung. Fourth cup of wine. 5. Jesus Serves Jesus washes the disciples' feet (John 13v1-17) Reading from John 13v1-5 - Before the Passover celebration, Jesus knew that his hour had come to leave this world and return to his Father. He had loved his disciples during his ministry on earth, and now he loved them to the very end. It was time for supper, and the devil had already prompted Judas, son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. Jesus knew that the Father had given him authority over everything and that he had come from God and would return to God. So he got up from the table, took off his robe, wrapped a towel around his waist, and poured water into a basin. Then he began to wash the disciples' feet, drying them with the towel he had around him. As part of the custom of the day, a servant or slave usually undertook foot washing of guests. Since none of the disciples had done this, Jesus Himself undertakes the task (John 13v4-5). Peter, recalcitrant and resistant as always, objects (John 13v6,8 ). Peter learns that only those cleansed by Jesus and trusting in Him fully, can be a part of the kingdom (John 13v7, 9). Jesus' rising to serve symbolizes His coming to serve - that was his mission we talked about earlier in the series! It was a mission of great love and service! When he took off his cloak, this symbolizes the taking off of His glory when He became human. As he girded Himself with a towel, symbolizes his taking on human flesh at his birth. And, as the water cleansed the feet, so Jesus death and blood cleanses from sin. When he finished cleaning, he returned to where he was sitting and sat down after finishing this act of service. 6. Jesus Speaks (Luke 22v24-38) Reading Luke 22v 24-27: Then they began to argue among themselves about who would be the greatest among them. Jesus told them, "In this world the kings and great men lord it over their people, yet they are called ‘friends of the people.' But among you it will be different. Those who are the greatest among you should take the lowest rank, and the leader should be like a servant. Who is more important, the one who sits at the table or the one who serves? The one who sits at the table, of course. But not here! For I am among you as one who serves. Here Jesus tells his disciples that they are the new leaders and thereforet they will judge the tribes of Israel! That in doing so, they are to serve everyone gladly, love everyone even those that they tested and persecute them! This is a radical new thing Jesus is telling his disciples - their actions are to back up their claims, just as Jesus' actions confirm his own claims! In so doing, Jesus replaces the old leaders of God with his own people. Tomorrow we look at that day in history - the day Jesus, the God-man, died. Thank you! Right mouse click or tap here to download as a MP3 audio file

I AM 2 G'day and welcome to Partake! We are now on day 16 of our series "Glimpses", looking at the story of the Bible in 30 days, from the time of creation through to the time of the fullness of redemption! Jesus' teaching has been met with amazement yet also fury and ridicule! Today we continue looking at one particularly aspect of his teaching - himself - and 3 more I AM statements. Light of the World Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, "I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won't have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life." The Pharisees replied, "You are making those claims about yourself! Such testimony is not valid." Jesus told them, "These claims are valid even though I make them about myself. For I know where I came from and where I am going. But you don't know this about me. You judge me by human standards, but I do not judge anyone. And if I did, my judgment would be correct in every respect because I am not alone. The Father who sent me is with me. Your own law says that if two people agree about something, their witness is accepted as fact. I am one witness, and my Father who sent me is the other." (John 8v12-18) ) Jesus is at the Feast of Tabernacles! One of the great symbols of that feast was Light! At the end of the feast, when all the lights are extinguished, Jesus said something quite remarkable - that he was the light of the world! Throughout the Old Testament, light is an important symbol. There is the pillar of fire and cloud leading the nation of Israel on their journey (Exodus 13). In Psalm 27v1, the psalmist describes God as "my light". The nation of Israel was to be God's light to all the world (Isaiah 49v6), so that God would be the world's light (Isaiah 60v19-22). So, by referring to himself as the light of the world, Jesus is saying it is he who shines light into people's spiritual eyes and gives them understanding, which in turn leads to them seeing their need of God and his ability to satisfy their spiritual needs. This was opposite to the burdens the Jewish religious leaders, the Pharisees, put upon people. Hence their vehement opposition to Jesus. I am the Gate and Good Shepherd "I tell you the truth, anyone who sneaks over the wall of a sheepfold, rather than going through the gate, must surely be a thief and a robber! But the one who enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep recognize his voice and come to him. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. After he has gathered his own flock, he walks ahead of them, and they follow him because they know his voice. They won't follow a stranger; they will run from him because they don't know his voice." Those who heard Jesus use this illustration didn't understand what he meant, so he explained it to them: "I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me were thieves and robbers. But the true sheep did not listen to them. Yes, I am the gate. Those who come in through me will be saved. They will come and go freely and will find good pastures. The thief's purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life. "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep. A hired hand will run when he sees a wolf coming. He will abandon the sheep because they don't belong to him and he isn't their shepherd. And so the wolf attacks them and scatters the flock. The hired hand runs away because he's working only for the money and doesn't really care about the sheep. "I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me, just as my Father knows me and I know the Father. So I sacrifice my life for the sheep. I have other sheep, too, that are not in this sheepfold. I must bring them also. They will listen to my voice, and there will be one flock with one shepherd. "The Father loves me because I sacrifice my life so I may take it back again. No one can take my life from me. I sacrifice it voluntarily. For I have the authority to lay it down when I want to and also to take it up again. For this is what my Father has commanded." (John 10v1-18) Throughout the Old Testament, God is seen as a shepherd and his people are the sheep of his keeping. The sheep are always God's, even though He temporarily entrusted them to people such as Moses to care and tend them. Therefore Moses and others like him, such as the true prophets, were forerunners to Jesus. David, you may remember, was the Shepherd King! Here Jesus proclaims that he is the door or gate to salvation! It is through Jesus that salvation is found and through him alone as the door or gate that people are led safe and sound into spiritual freedom, spiritual light and spiritual sustenance. Unlike others who come only to steal, kill and destroy, Jesus offers spiritual safety and nourishment. Jesus does not just offer a way out, but also a way in! The security offered by Jesus is because he is always in close proximity to those who follow him. Jesus calls all those who follow him by name (John 10v3) and they know each other. Jesus is also the great shepherd through the sacrifice he must make for his sheep. It is in this role of shepherd, that Jesus exhibits true leadership, which is self-less and sacrificial. Ezekiel 34v11 tells of God searching out for his sheep among all nations, and this is fulfilled through Jesus. Here Jesus is looking ahead to the sacrifice he will make. His love for all of humanity compels him to make the ultimate sacrifice. Just as all shepherds will endanger themselves for the safety of their sheep, so too will Jesus endure the pain and suffering, so that all people can be led into the safety of God's kingdom if they choose to avail themselves of that opportunity. Through his perfect, obedient and voluntary sacrifice, not only will salvation be available to the Jews (the sheep of Israel) but also to those of other nations, the Gentiles (the other sheep mentioned by Jesus). Remember that often in Israel, certainly under 1st century Gentile Roman rule, Gentiles (non-Jews) were hated and many Jews declared thanks to God that they were neither dogs nor Gentiles! Truly amazing words by Jesus in the light of such sentiments! Jesus already has the end in view. Can you glimpse at what he means when he speaks about laying down his life and taking it back up again? Can you see where we glimpsed at the Covenants and how they apply to this Jesus - particularly the Davidic Covenant (Father and Son) and the New Covenant? Can you see how this Jesus is divisive and what sets him apart from all other religious teachers of any time? This Jesus, at the moment is only speaking words, but will his words be backed up with action? Tomorrow, more I AM statements as we reflect on Jesus' teaching about himself. Thank you. Right mouse click or tap here to download as a MP3 audio file

Delivered by Evelyn from the Parish of Holy Spirit in the Archdiocese of Singapore. Exodus 3: 13-20; Rs psalm 105: 1.5.8-9.24-25.26-27; Matthew 11: 28-30.KNOWING GOD BY HIS NAME The title for our meditation today is:Knowing God by His Name. Yesterday we reflected on the identity of God throughthe pronouncement of the name of the ancestors of Israel to Moses. By this wayMoses could immediately associate himself with his own ancestors and then beable to imitate their examples of the faith. Today, the book of Exodus leads us toknow God in His own name. This knowledge touches the very personal being ofGod, that is by mentioning His own name. To Moses God mentioned his name withthe expression: I am who I am. In this identification God revelas himself as asingle Godhead, a personal principle of God. The pronoun "I" refersto the wholeness in oneself and cannot be put together with something else toexplain or clarify it. For example, for me, I must say myname is Maria, I am a woman, I am a nun, I am a professional, I am part of thisfamily and so on. There are so many elements attached to me to explain what andwho I am. But God does not use these complementary elements because He isalready perfect, complete. So God calls himself "I" means that He isperfect and total. He is eternal. For the name "I" whichaffirms the principle of self, it does not refers to the selfishness of God.Only God can maintain this principle because He is almighty and omnipotent.With this superiority, Moses and all of us make as an opportune of bringingGod's superiority to face evil enemies and those who oppose His will, even todefeat those enemies. For us humans, an affirmation of oneself only, the ego orselfishness, it is actually a great weakness and evetually failure. Whendealing with works, challenges or even threat from enemies, this weakness isnot a big deal to face the problem. It is obvious our human ego is so differentfrom the ego of God. The "I" affirmation of Godis also carried out by the Son of God, Jesus Christ, especially when He alwayssays: Amen, I say to you. Here Jesus continues to declare the name of God inHis Word. Jesus never says in His teachings, saying: “Jesus says to you.” Thisaffirmation of "I" for Himself also means to bring all those who hearand believe come to Him, stay with Him and follow His way of life. Today, Jesusinvites us to come to Him to draw from His great mercy in this expression:"Come to Me, because I am meek and humble." Let us always believe andrely on God's name as I AM WHO I AM. Let's pray. In the name of theFather ... O good Lord, thank you so much for showing yourself to uspersonally, may we always rely on your love and power. Glory to the Father andto the Son and to the Holy Spirit ... In the name of the Father ...

I AM 1 We are now on day 15 of our series "Glimpses", looking at the story of the Bible in 30 days, from the time of creation through to the time of the fullness of redemption! The long awaited for king is here, his public ministry has begun in earnest. His teaching is met with amazement yet also fury and we looked at last time, how Jesus taught; what he taught; his methods and who he taught? Today we start looking at one particularly aspect of his teaching - himself! I AM Introduction It may come as a surprise to you but Jesus talks about himself - a lot! But, not only just talk about himself but always put those words into action. In other words, he backed up his claims with action, which even a cursory look at the Gospels will reflect. John Stott says this about it: ‘The self-centredness of the teaching of Jesus immediately sets himself apart from the other great religious teachers of the world. They were self-effacing. He was self-advancing. They pointed away from themselves, saying "This is the truth, so far as I perceive it, follow that." Jesus said, "I am the truth, follow me."' Jesus' teaching about Himself? In John's Gospel, the writer John records statements where Jesus said "I AM". These are unique to John and are not recorded in the three other Gospels. Here Jesus is reinforcing his claims to be God because, when he says "I AM", he is referring back to the time when God revealed Himself to Moses in Exodus 3v14 and through the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 41v4. That's why crowds often picked up stones in order to kill him for blasphemy. This was in accordance, so they thought, with Deuteronomy 13, which dictates that anyone who tries to turn people away from the living God is to be stoned to death. They knew Jesus was claiming to the very God they thought they worshipped. Little did they know at the time that he was the living God! So lets go look at our first "I AM" I AM the bread of Life John 6:30-51 They answered, "Show us a miraculous sign if you want us to believe in you. What can you do? After all, our ancestors ate manna while they journeyed through the wilderness! The Scriptures say, ‘Moses gave them bread from heaven to eat.'" Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, Moses didn't give you bread from heaven. My Father did. And now he offers you the true bread from heaven. The true bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." "Sir," they said, "give us that bread every day." Jesus replied, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again. Whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. But you haven't believed in me even though you have seen me. However, those the Father has given me will come to me, and I will never reject them. For I have come down from heaven to do the will of God who sent me, not to do my own will. And this is the will of God, that I should not lose even one of all those he has given me, but that I should raise them up at the last day. For it is my Father's will that all who see his Son and believe in him should have eternal life. I will raise them up at the last day." Then the people began to murmur in disagreement because he had said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven." They said, "Isn't this Jesus, the son of Joseph? We know his father and mother. How can he say, ‘I came down from heaven'?" But Jesus replied, "Stop complaining about what I said. For no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them to me, and at the last day I will raise them up. As it is written in the Scriptures, ‘They will all be taught by God.' Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me. (Not that anyone has ever seen the Father; only I, who was sent from God, have seen him.) "I tell you the truth, anyone who believes has eternal life. Yes, I am the bread of life! Your ancestors ate manna in the wilderness, but they all died. Anyone who eats the bread from heaven, however, will never die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever; and this bread, which I will offer so the world may live, is my flesh." ___________________________________________ Three times in this passage, Jesus refers to himself as the living bread. By this he meant that he was the only one who could gratify the appetite and yearning of every person's spirit and their spiritual needs. For those he was speaking to, bread was a basic staple food for living, just as it is for millions of people today. Jesus indicates when saying he is the bread of life, that he will supply all needs! Just as he said to the woman at the well in John 4v4, and repeats here, that whoever drinks his living water, shall never again go spiritually thirsty. When Jesus referred to the bread in the desert he talked of it being merely temporary, despite being a gift from God. He however, as the true bread of life, would give permanent satisfaction and life everlasting to all those who believe and follow him! But this bread he offers has to be eaten; it has to be taken up by the person wanting spiritual life! In this passage from John 6 he offers glimpses of what is lying ahead for him. He also gives glimpses of the intimacy he held with God the Father. Soon after this, some people stopped following him and abandoned him because they found it too difficult to understand. How easily people give up and not persevere. Jesus is the bread of life! To have true spiritual life is to believe in Him! No works or good deeds can earn this spiritual life from God - just believe by having faith in Jesus alone. All spiritual needs are met through Jesus alone as the bread of life! Jesus will supply needs - spiritual as well as physical. This is only a glimpse at what Jesus taught about himself and we continue on this theme tomorrow! Thank you! Right mouse click or tap here to download as a MP3 audio file

"Laat ons almal saam bid: “Maranatha, kom tog gou, Here Jesus.”

Today we turn to John chapter four, and verses ten through twenty-four, which is the inspiration for our present series, “In Spirit and in Truth.” Here Jesus has a conversation with a Samaritan Woman, and conveys something profound. You'll soon see the sort of worship that pleases God. It's something that is to occur all throughout the day, every day, with sincerity. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/1459/29

This message looks at Matthew 5:33-37. Here Jesus is calling us to have honesty with our words and simplicity with our speech, that our words are trustworthy and that our words build others up.  We are reminded that where our words might fail, God's words never fail. He means what He says. 

Unfortunately, many people are Christian in name only. It was true in Jesus' day as well, and that's why He shared the parable of the Sower. That will be our topic of discussion once again today as we look at Mark chapter four. Here Jesus describes four kinds of soil, and we'd do well to see which best describes our heart , to see whether or not we are who we think! 

Here Jesus focuses on our response to his Word—and the eternal implications of that response. We need to avoid false teachers as being very dangerous, we need to bear fruit as a sign of our response to the Word, and we need to be careful to build our lives on the solid and secure foundation of his Word.

Here Jesus focuses on our response to his Word—and the eternal implications of that response. We need to avoid false teachers as being very dangerous, we need to bear fruit as a sign of our response to the Word, and we need to be careful to build our lives on the solid and secure foundation of his Word.

(Mark 10:1-12) As we continue our journey through the Gospel of Mark we come to another challenging teaching that has often been misused and misunderstood. Here Jesus takes the opportunity to share about divorce, to share God's heart and how the tension that arises can be navigated. Join us as Gavin unpacks this teaching and what it means.

Send us a textMarkus 2:13-14 Jesus het weer na die see toe gegaan. 'n Hele menigte mense het na Hom toe gekom, en Hy het hulle geleer. Toe Hy by die tolhuis verbygaan, sien Hy vir Levi seun van Alfeus daar sit, en Hy sê vir hom: “Volg My!” Levi het opgestaan en Hom gevolg. Wanneer jy na al die suksesvolle mense rondom jou kyk, diegene in die kollig, diegene wat gereeld die klop op die skouer kry en "welgedaan" toegeroep word, en jy vergelyk jouself met hulle, dan is dit maklik om minderwaardig te voel.As ek terugdink, is een van die dinge in my lewe waaroor ek werklik spyt is, die feit dat die wêreldse prentjie van hoe ‘n suksesvolle persoon moet lyk, op een of ander manier in my kop nes gemaak het. Dit het my in 'n wêreld van pyn gedompel wat ek andersins sou kon vermy het. Ek het vas geglo dat sukses alles is - my ideaal was om die duurste motor in my portuurgroep te hê, om 'n indrukwekkende huis met een van daardie prentjiemooi versorgde grasperke in die voortuin te hê, en die duurste klere te dra... Weet jy hoe dit my lewe verwoes het? Dit het my van my belangrikste verhoudings beroof, om die waarheid te sê, van byna al my verhoudings, want in my strewe na sukses, het ek nie omgegee wie ek in die proses platgetrap het nie. Toe ek alles verloor het, was ek absoluut seker dat niemand iets met my te doen sou wou hê nie.  Markus 2:13-14 Jesus het weer na die see toe gegaan. 'n Hele menigte mense het na Hom toe gekom, en Hy het hulle geleer. Toe Hy by die tolhuis verbygaan, sien Hy vir Levi seun van Alfeus daar sit, en Hy sê vir hom: “Volg My!” Levi het opgestaan en Hom gevolg. Jesus, was op hierdie stadium reeds ‘n baie belangrike persoon met ‘n groot aanhang onder die mense. En hier kom Hy en nooi 'n tollenaar, Levi, wat destyds deur die Jode verag en verstoot is, om Hom te volg. Nee, my maat, moet nooit besluit dat jy nie goed genoeg is nie. Dit maak nie saak hoe ver jy dalk geval het, of hoe hopeloos jy dalk voel nie, die liefdevolle oog van die Here Jesus is op jou.   Dit is God se Woord. Vars … vir jou … vandag. Support the showEnjoying The Content?For the price of a cup of coffee each month, you can enable Christianityworks to reach 10,000+ people with a message about the love of Jesus!DONATE R50 MONTHLY

“Type” has to do with forms, shapes, patterns, images. People demonstrate “typical” behavior when they act in a similar pattern time and again. In typesetting, a block with a typographic character on it makes an image of that character on the page. Our first four Bible studies in this year's series have focused on straightforward messianic prophecies, which abound in the Old Testament. However, Jesus and His church are prefigured in other ways in the Old Testament. This is known as typology — seeing an Old Testament person or event (a “type”) as a pattern for a New Testament one (the “antitype”). This sort of interpretation is employed by the New Testament, which shows us how it can be done responsibly (and not fancifully!). For example, Jesus says, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life” (John 3:14–15). Here Jesus teaches about Himself and His work by pointing back to Numbers 21:4–9, with the bronze serpent that saved snakebitten Israelites (the type) corresponding to Jesus as One who was lifted up on the cross that we might look to Him in faith and be saved (the antitype). In this study, we will look at more typological connections between the Old Testament and New Testament. Rev. Carl Roth, pastor of Grace Lutheran Church in Elgin, TX, joins Sarah to talk about the “Searching Scripture” feature in the May 2025 issue of the Lutheran Witness titled “Isn't That Typical?” on Typological Connections throughout Scripture. This year, “Searching Scripture” is themed “Opening the Old Testament” and will walk through ways that the Old Testament witnesses to Jesus Christ and His grace, mercy and peace, delivered through the holy Christian church. Follow along every month and search Scripture with us! Find online exclusives of the Lutheran Witness at witness.lcms.org and subscribe to the Lutheran Witness at cph.org/witness.

“Type” has to do with forms, shapes, patterns, images. People demonstrate “typical” behavior when they act in a similar pattern time and again. In typesetting, a block with a typographic character on it makes an image of that character on the page. Our first four Bible studies in this year's series have focused on straightforward messianic prophecies, which abound in the Old Testament. However, Jesus and His church are prefigured in other ways in the Old Testament. This is known as typology — seeing an Old Testament person or event (a “type”) as a pattern for a New Testament one (the “antitype”). This sort of interpretation is employed by the New Testament, which shows us how it can be done responsibly (and not fancifully!). For example, Jesus says, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life” (John 3:14–15). Here Jesus teaches about Himself and His work by pointing back to Numbers 21:4–9, with the bronze serpent that saved snakebitten Israelites (the type) corresponding to Jesus as One who was lifted up on the cross that we might look to Him in faith and be saved (the antitype). In this study, we will look at more typological connections between the Old Testament and New Testament. Rev. Carl Roth, pastor of Grace Lutheran Church in Elgin, TX, joins Sarah to talk about the “Searching Scripture” feature in the May 2025 issue of the Lutheran Witness titled “Isn't That Typical?” on Typological Connections throughout Scripture. This year, “Searching Scripture” is themed “Opening the Old Testament” and will walk through ways that the Old Testament witnesses to Jesus Christ and His grace, mercy and peace, delivered through the holy Christian church. Follow along every month and search Scripture with us! Find online exclusives of the Lutheran Witness at witness.lcms.org and subscribe to the Lutheran Witness at cph.org/witness. Have a topic you'd like to hear about on The Coffee Hour? Contact us at: listener@kfuo.org.

In this sermon Pastor Clint preaches Luke 4:14–30. Here Jesus proclaims Himself as the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy, offering grace to the poor and oppressed. The people of Nazareth reject Him, offended that someone so familiar could make such a claim and that God's grace might extend to outsiders. Their pride and unbelief prevent them from receiving the grace of Christ, leading them to attempt to kill Him.

Send us a textMatteus 28:19-20 Gaan dan na al die nasies toe en maak die mense my dissipels: doop hulle in die Naam van die Vader en die Seun en die Heilige Gees, en leer hulle om alles te onderhou wat Ek julle beveel het. En onthou: Ek is by julle al die dae tot die voleinding van die wêreld.” Jy kan vir ‘n KI-rekenaar 'n vraag vra, en binne enkele sekondes sal dit sulke deeglike navorsing doen en met die antwoorde te voorskyn kom, wat jou destyds ure se naslaan in 'n biblioteek sou geneem het. Ons is so bederf daardeur, dat ons deesdae dink mense moet net so blitsig die regte antwoorde hê.Ek het onlangs met my vriend, Dave, wat op sy eie besig is om ‘n kamer by sy huis aan te bou, gesels. Een van die redes waarom hy dit geniet om te bou, het hy gesê, is die onmiddellike terugvoer. Dit neem ‘n paar uur en daar staan 'n muur waar daar voorheen niks was nie. Nog 'n paar uur later en 'n venster gaan in. Hy kan terugstaan en met trots kyk wat hy gebou het.Maar my vriend 'n pastoor belê in mense; jy belê en jy belê; sommige mense sal jou deur die gesig klap, maar jy belê steeds, en jy sal dalk vir maande, selfs jare ... nooit verandering sien nie! Ek bewonder daardie geduld en liefde.Wie is die mense in wie se lewe God jou geroep het om te belê? Hoe geduldig is jy met hulle? Hoe maklik verloor jy moed? Net voordat Hy na die hemel opgevaar het, het Jesus vir sy dissipels gesê...Matteus 28:19-20 Gaan dan na al die nasies toe en maak die mense my dissipels: doop hulle in die Naam van die Vader en die Seun en die Heilige Gees, en leer hulle om alles te onderhou wat Ek julle beveel het. En onthou: Ek is by julle al die dae tot die voleinding van die wêreld.”Om mense dissipels van die Here Jesus te maak en hulle te leer om gehoorsaam te wees aan Hom is baie belangrike, maar harde werk. Moenie moed verloor met daardie een moeilike persoon in jou lewe, wat lyk asof hy nooit gaan reageer nie. Wanneer jy dit vergelyk met KI-werk, waar jy onmiddellike oplossings vir probleme kry, kan jy jou regmaak vir die feit: transformasie van ‘n mens se lewe neem soms baie lank.Die goeie nuus is egter dat Jesus altyd by jou sal wees. Hy sal geduldig saam met jou werk, selfs al neem dit tot die einde van die tyd.Dis Sy Woord. Vars … vir jou … vandag. Support the showEnjoying The Content?For the price of a cup of coffee each month, you can enable Christianityworks to reach 10,000+ people with a message about the love of Jesus!DONATE R50 MONTHLY

(Mark 9:14-27) As we continue our journey through Mark's Gospel we come to another powerful example of Jesus' healing. Yet like many of these examples; it is not just the healing that Jesus wants us to pay attention to. Here Jesus unpacks a powerful lesson for both those waiting for healing, and those seeking healing for others. Join us as Megan unpacks this passage and challenges us about how this passage applies to us today.

. Join us for this very special season here on the Unchanging Word Bible Broadcast as we look at the Savior on the Cross.We continue the study of the Gospel of John chapter 19 starting at verse 25 with Dr. John G. Mitchell here on the Unchanging Word Bible study.Our study today looks at Jesus on the cross speaking with Mary, His mother and the beloved disciple. Here Jesus takes care of His own. Not only this, but Dr. Mitchell describes here how every Scripture prophetically given about Jesus, He literally fulfills. The apostle John is also an eyewitness of Jesus fulfillment of Scripture as he says in verses 35 and 36.Now, Jesus' words in verse 30 "It is finished" meaning "paid in full", comprises the complete fulfillment of all that was literally written for Him at His first coming, especially here with His death on the cross. So, how much more when He comes again, for His own -- literally?Turn with us in your Bible to John 19 verse 25 with Dr. Mitchell.

Luke 12:35-48 - Here Jesus tells two short parables about what faithfulness looks like for those who wait on Him. We don't know when He will return, but we know we are called to be ready and faithful in the meantime. All disciples are called to ready, watchful waiting, and leaders have a special burden to serve at Jesus's pleasure, under Jesus's vision, by Jesus's methods, with Jesus's tone, for Jesus's purposes. In these two parables we learn about the grace and justice at the heart of God, both flowing out of His love, and both reaching their culmination on the last day. A sermon by Cameron Heger. [Part 7 of our series "Imagining the Kingdom: Jesus's stories about the already and not yet reign of God"] Questions for reflection: 1) Can you think of an example of how certainty of a future event shaped your behavior in the waiting? What was that like? 2) What does it look like for us today to be "dressed for action" with "lamps burning?" What is spiritual readiness in light of Jesus's return? 3) What is surprising about the master's behavior in Luke 12:37? How did Jesus himself embody this? 4) The second parable (vv. 42-48) focuses on those entrusted with leadership responsibility. What does the manager's abusive behavior look like when we see it today? 5) How does the master's (Jesus's) severity toward the abusive manager reveal God's love? 6) This passage points to the fact that the return of Christ will be a day of both grace and justice. How do these two values come together in the cross of Jesus?

We will be continuing our study of Mark in chapter 15:1-20. Here Jesus will go before Pilate, be traded for a criminal, and be mocked by Roman soldiers. We hope to see you Sunday where we will study these verses in depth and see how everything Jesus goes through was on our behalf.

Caleb Drahosh On the same day He spoke His first parables, Jesus and His disciples got into a boat to cross the sea. A windstorm came up and the disciples found themselves living a parable. In the parables, Jesus explained how small things bring about big results. Here Jesus' three simple words end a violent storm suddenly. But the disciples aren't relieved; they're terrified. They witness the absolute and immediate holiness of God.

Toe sê iemand vir Hom: Here, is die wat gered word, min? En Hy antwoord hulle: Stry hard om in te gaan deur die nou poort, want baie, sê Ek vir julle, sal probeer om in te gaan en sal nie in staat wees nie. (Luk. 13:23-24)Gaan in deur die nou poort, want breed is die poort en wyd is die pad wat na die verderf lei, en daar is baie wat daardeur ingaan. Want die poort is nou en die pad is smal wat na die lewe lei, en daar is min wat dit vind. (Matt. 7:13-14)Ek is die deur; as iemand deur My ingaan, sal hy gered word, en hy sal ingaan en uitgaan en weiding vind. (Joh. 10:9)Maar almal wat Hom aangeneem het, aan hulle het Hy mag gegee om kinders van God te word, aan hulle wat in sy Naam glo; wat nie uit die bloed of uit die wil van die vlees of uit die wil van ‘n man nie, maar uit God gebore is. (Joh. 1:12-13)As jy met jou mond die Here Jesus bely en met jou hart glo dat God Hom uit die dode opgewek het, sal jy gered word; want met die hart glo ons tot geregtigheid en met die mond bely ons tot redding. (Rom. 10:9-10)Die woord van die HERE het dan tot my gekom en gesê: Voordat Ek jou in die moederskoot gevorm het, het Ek jou geken; en voordat jy uit die liggaam voortgekom het, het Ek jou geheilig; Ek het jou tot ‘n profeet vir die nasies gemaak. (Jer. 1:4-5)

In week 3 of our 40 Days on the Mount we explore Matthew chapter 6. Here Jesus continues his Sermon on the Mount. Jesus assures us that God sees our acts of kindness, hears our prayers and knows our needs. He emphasises the importance of our motives behind these acts. Are we doing these things to impress people or to draw close and honour God? When we do things to impress people rather than God they are many times fear based and based on our need to be seen. But when our acts are based on sincere trust and obedience to God we can rest in peace. When we seek first the king and the kingdom, all the things we need to living will be given to us-therefore there is no need to worry or fear. God sees you-God knows your need. Seek God first. To support the ministry of Melbourne Inclusive Church go to: www.michurch.org.au/give Melbourne Inclusive Church boldly and proudly proclaims Christ's equal love for all people regardless of their ability, socio-economic status, sexual orientation, age, gender, race, ethnicity, or culture. Melbourne Inclusive Church is part of the EMI Global family of churches.

Luke 12:1-12 begins with Jesus giving a warning to Hisdisciples to, “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy”.Jesus said, “Beware of hypocrisy”! Then He teaches us how to overcomethe temptation of hypocrisy and compromising our Christian faith. Hypocrisy isa terrible sin that destroys our responsibility and opportunities to be a faithfulwitness for the Lord Jesus to the lost world around us. We should take thiswarning of our Lord to heart every day! Today in Luke 12:13-21, the Lord is giving us anotherwarning! Here Jesus says, “Take heed and beware of covetousness!” Atthis point, Jesus is approached by a man in the crowd who interrupted Him by askingHim as the Rabbi or Teacher, to solve a family problem and help settle a legaldispute with him and his brother over their inheritance. Rabbis were expectedto help settle legal matters, but Jesus refused to get involved. Why? BecauseHe knew that no answer He gave would solve the real problem, which wascovetousness in the hearts of the two brothers.  The "you" in Luke 12:14 is plural, which meantJesus is speaking to both of the brothers. As long as both men were greedy, nosettlement would be satisfactory. Their greatest need was to have their heartschanged. Like too many people today, they wanted Jesus to serve them but not tosave them. Jesus also knew the crowd needed to hear this warning, so, “He saidto them, Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's lifedoes not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses."  Jesus knew we needed to hear this warning tooand we should “take heed” and listen carefully to what He has to say about thissin of covetousness. Someone said that covetousness is an unquenchable thirstfor getting more and more of something we think we need in order to be trulysatisfied. It may be a thirst for money or the things that money can buy, oreven a thirst for position and power. Jesus made it clear that true life doesnot depend on an abundance of possessions. He did not deny that we have certainbasic needs (Matt. 6:32; 1 Tim. 6:17). He only affirmed that we will not makelife richer by acquiring more of these things. Mark Twain once defined "civilization" as "alimitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities," and he was right. Infact, many Christians are infected with covetousness and do not know it. Theythink that Paul's admonition in 1 Timothy 6 applies only to the "rich andfamous." Measured by the living standards of the rest of the world, mostbelievers in America are indeed wealthy people. Jesus then told this parable of a rich farmer to reveal thedangers that lurk in a covetous heart. As we read and study it, we will noticeseveral things. We need to recognize that Jesus did not say this wealthy manwas a fool because he was rich. He was not a fool because he worked hard and wasfugal and saved a lot of money that he now had available for himself. No, Jesussays he was a fool because after he acquire this money and goods, that he didn'tknow what to do with it. This no doubt is a sin that many of us have in America. Thepoorest person in America is richer that ninety-five percent of the rest of theworld. We tend to waste money, spend money, and invest money to gain more moneyand a better living, but we spend it and invest it for temporal rather than theeternal. I love this quote by the missionary Jim Elliot, “He is nofool who gives up that which he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”As we think about this warning from Jesus, we need to look into our own heartstoday and make sure we are not seeking to be satisfied with money orpossessions. Their satisfaction is only temporary and will not meet the deepestneed of our soul that can only be satisfied by our relationship with JesusChrist!  Today, may God help us to “beware of covetousness” and seekJesus first and foremost (Matthew 6:33).  God bless!

Leviticus 19 can be summarised in one verse. Verse 19 of this chapter says, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself”. This is sometimes called the golden rule – stated another way it could be said, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. In the New Testament Jesus highlighted this teaching in Matthew 22:36-40. Paul explains it in Romans 1:8-10; and James describes it as the royal law in James 2:8-13. Every command in Leviticus 19 is designed for the protection of the weak and the benefit of the entire nation. Everyone who lived by these principles would fulfil each of the Ten Commandments from the sixth to the tenth commandment. You would not bare false witness if you loved your neighbour; nor would you steal or kill. Therefore love is the fulfilment of the law – its crowning pinnacle. Verses 81-128 of Psalm 119 cover stanzas 11-16 and therefore also the letters from the Hebrew alphabet of 11-16. The Psalmist, as we have said, was prophetically revealing to us the mind and motivations of the Messiah – our Lord Jesus Christ. What should be apparent to us is his positive attitude. His thoughts were always directed towards pleasing his Father. We must learn to live life from the standpoint of counting every blessing day by day. Whenever we feel negative thoughts pressing upon us, then stop and affirm to ourselves that God loves and cares for us. His Son told us, “Fear not little flock, it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom”. Let us take a few verses for our encouragement and being built up in our most holy faith – verses 89-94; verse 90; verses 97-100; verses 103-105 and verses 125-128. Slowly read these aloud and think deeply on their significance to you. In Luke 2 we have the record of the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. The whole world was turned upside down by the decree of Caesar Augustus that there must be a census. This required vast movements of people to their ancestral homes. Joseph and his heavily pregnant wife, Mary, are caused to go to Bethlehem. When there was no room in the inn (Chimham's lodging house from the time of king David) they found lodging among the cattle. In such humble circumstances the king of the world is born. A multitude of angels appear to the Bethlehem shepherds, who were watching over the lambs which were to be sacrificed at the next Passover. The message of the angels was that when God is glorified in the earth then there would be peace among men of good will. We then find the record of Jesus being taken to the temple for the required offerings. Mary's offerings were for those of the poorest. We are told of the faithful Anna and Simeon who were in expectation of Messiah's redemption of the nation. Jesus is taken by Joseph and Mary to Egypt in order to escape Herod the Great's slaughter of the babes of Bethlehem (this is recorded in Matthew 2). Luke takes up the story after Herod's death, when they were returned from Egypt and their moving to Nazareth in Galilee. Here Jesus remains until the age of twelve when he went with his parents to the temple in Jerusalem. Jesus became “lost” when the family was returning to Galilee. When the family came to Jerusalem seeking for Jesus they found him in the temple discussing the Law with the doctors of the Law. What child was this? The record tells us that as well as hearing these learned men Jesus was also asking questions of them. Our Lord gave the rejoinder to Joseph, his step father and Mary – where else did you think I would be? It is my Father's business that motivates me. Mary kept these matters in her heart and often pondered them. On returning to Nazareth he took the appropriate role of an obedient child. Jesus' wisdom increased rapidly, as did the pleasure of His Father in His wonderful Son. People found him amiable and agreeable in every capacity.

Today pastor Lloyd takes us back to the gospel of John, chapter five.  Here Jesus  points to His works and the scripture as the basis for faith, and that He is indeed God's promised Messiah. Despite the obvious evidence, there were still a lot of skeptics around back then, just as there are today. 

Hello New King Church, we are so excited to continue our study in Mark this week through chapter 12:13-17. Here Jesus addresses the Pharisees' questions about paying taxes and being faithful to God. These verses will challenge us to consider where our true allegiances lie and how we can honor God no matter where we live. We hope you will join us Sunday!  

January 19, 2025 The first miracle of John's Gospel is one of a gracious provision that takes place at a wedding in Cana of Galilee.  Here Jesus shows himself to be the Son of God and the promised Messiah. Scripture: John 2:1-11

Sunday, 5 January 2025   And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. Matthew 6:13   “And not may You lead us into temptation, but rescue us from the evil. For Yours, it is, the kingdom, and the power, and the glory to the ages. Amen” (CG).   In the previous verse, Jesus spoke of the forgiving of debts. Now, He finishes up the prayer, beginning with, “And not may You lead us into temptation.”   The word here has two main meanings. The first is the negative connotation of being tempted. The other refers to being tested, as in a trial. At times the two thoughts can overlap. A temptation arises that tests the caliber of the one being tested. The prayer is to be kept from being led into such a situation.   In James 1, it says –   “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God'; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. 14 But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. 15 Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.” James 1:13-15   Here Jesus' prayer petitions the Lord to not lead a person into temptation. The thoughts seem contradictory, but this isn't so. There is a difference between being led along life's path and facing temptation and actively tempting someone.   The Lord led Israel in the wilderness. He called Moses up the mountain, and while Moses was there for an extended time, the people were tempted to build a golden calf and worship it. God didn't actively tempt them to do this. Rather, they were drawn away by their own desires into sin.   If God had fashioned the golden calf and placed it at the entrance to the camp, the situation would be different. Jesus is instructing the people to pray to avoid the process that may lead to temptation. In essence, “Lord, keep my life from bringing me to the point where I am tempted.”   The fact that Jesus says this indicates that praying for a life without such leading is perfectly acceptable. Understanding this, He next says, “but rescue us from the evil.”   This contrasts what was just said. The words “the evil” either refer to Satan, the one who tempts, or the state of falling into and acting on temptation. Either way, it is a prayer to not face such temptations, something that Job is specifically recorded as having gone through. The Lord allowed Satan to put Job through great trials of his faith. Jesus is saying that we can pray to not face such things.   As for the word rhuomai, translated as “rescue,” it is introduced here. It gives the sense of being drawn or pulled. It implies that danger is present and they are in need of rescue to be delivered out of it. As this is dealing with sin and its consequences, it is a petition to deliver a person from what is bringing about such a situation. Jesus next says, “For Yours, it is, the kingdom.”   It is an acknowledgment that God has the authority over such things and is fully capable of responding to such a prayer favorably. This doesn't mean the response will be favorable. The Lord may allow a specific ordeal into one's life for His own good purposes, such as when Joseph was sold off to slavery in Egypt. That served a greater purpose, and we must consider that our trials and afflictions may as well. Jesus next says, “and the power.”   The word dunamis is introduced here. One can see the root of our current word dynamite. It signifies power in both ability and strength. At times, it is translated as “miracle.” A miracle is something beyond the normally expected ability of someone, or that occurs beyond a normally expected result in a given event.   God has the power, both in capability and in strength, to effect His purposes as well as to bring about the petitions of His people if He so chooses. Lastly, Jesus says, “and the glory to the ages. Amen.”   The immediate purpose of granting the prayers of His people is to provide their relief as petitioned by them. But the ultimate goal of all such things is the glory of God. When such a prayer is favorably responded to, the Lord should be magnified for having delivered the response. In all things, the glory of God should be the paramount consideration in the lives of His people.   Life application: The second half of this verse is not found in many manuscripts. Therefore, it is not recorded in many translations. Which manuscripts are correct is hotly debated. Unless this can be definitively determined, it is best to include the words, footnoting them with the controversy.   To leave out something that is original, especially without footnoting it, will leave a deficiency in the word. To include it without a footnote would be to add to the word. But if it is footnoted, at least this would be known to the reader. Hence, footnoting should be used in translations if at all possible.   When starting a new translation of the Bible, be sure to read the preface and find out what the translators have done and why. The preface often contains such information, and it will help you know what is going on in the minds of the translators.   There is not normally a sinister plot to manipulate the word. However, there are times when purposeful manipulation takes place. If you are unsure of a particular translation, you can normally search the internet and get a competent evaluation of it. So, be diligent in your study of the word. When difficulties arise, research them. In the end, the more time you put into the word, the more you will get out of it as you live out your walk before the Lord.   Lord God, lead us on the proper path of faith, especially in knowing and rightly handling Your word. It is the tool You have provided for us to know You and to interact with You in matters of faith. So, Lord, guide us all our days as we search it out. Amen.  

 John 14:25-27  I am telling you these things now while I am still with you. But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.  “I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don't be troubled or afraid.     In this passage, the baby Jesus we celebrated on Christmas has now lived about 30 years, and he's coming to the crossroads of what He came to do. He is sharing with his closest friends who, unbeknownst to them, are about to encounter complete chaos and, from the way it seems, the whole plan falling apart. Their Messiah, their friend, is murdered in front of them.     Peace is not a place, Peace is a person, Peace is a Presence. This same Presence is with us now, just as he was with his friends, his disciples, thousands of years ago.   Here Jesus is clearly telling us that: Number one, the Holy Spirit, who is one with Jesus and the Father, is with us to remind us of everything that he said.   Number two, He says don't be troubled or afraid even when things seem like they're all falling apart. Jesus has left us with a gift, peace of mind and heart.     What thoughts are troubling your mind right now that you can ask for peace of mind?   What heartache are you feeling right now that you can ask God to bring peace to your heart?    Jesus says the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give, so don't be troubled or afraid…     Breathe    PRAY:  Lord Jesus, we celebrate that holy moment when Your coming as man renewed our hearts. Excite in me a hunger for peace: peace in the world, peace in my home, peace in myself. Peace that only You can bring. Immanuel, God with us. Amen

7. Messiah's Leadership Zechariah 10:1 - 5 10:1 Ask of Yahweh rain in the spring time, Yahweh who makes storm clouds, and he gives rain showers to everyone for the plants in the field. 10:2 For the teraphim have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie; and they have told false dreams. They comfort in vain. Therefore they go their way like sheep. They are oppressed, because there is no shepherd. 10:3 My anger is kindled against the shepherds, and I will punish the male goats; For Yahweh of Armies has visited his flock, the house of Judah, and will make them as his majestic horse in the battle. 10:4 From him will come forth the cornerstone, from him the nail, from him the battle bow, from him every ruler together. 10:5 They shall be as mighty men, treading down muddy streets in the battle; and they shall fight, because Yahweh is with them; and the riders on horses will be confounded. During the time of Zechariah, the Temple was being rebuilt. The Temple was central to Jewish worship. But who would help give advice and solve the multitude of problems they were facing? Who cared about them? Well, Zechariah speaks into their situation with wise words. He has already likened the nation of Israel as being like sheep, and that God is their shepherd (Zechariah 9:16) "Yahweh their God will save them in that day as the flock of his people; for they are like the jewels of a crown, lifted on high over his land. ". Throughout Chapter 10, it is repeated again and again, that God will care for and bless them. But in order to receive the blessing and care, the nation of Israelites must seek, turn and follow. Seek God If the people need advice and help in times of trouble and need, the first place they should look, is to the Lord their God. They must seek and ask of Him! (10:1)! God can provide all things! He can control the weather, but these people need to stop being so independent, self-sufficient and start to rely on God and His infinite wisdom and resources. Turn to God In 10:2, Zechariah reminds the people of Israel, that following idols and false gods is foolishness. These idols are self-seeking, liars and deceivers. Israel needed to turn back to the One True Almighty God! Instead of following the glory of the Almighty God, they were turning to idols for worship, advice and listening to superstitious nonsense. And of course idols and false gods are mute! They cannot speak or give advice because they are not Gods at all!! The sin of idolatry particularly broke the second commandment! The people were to turn away from false gods and return to worship the One True Almighty God. They were also to listen to the true prophets of God instead of the false prophets who deceived by speaking words they wanted to hear. Follow Me These sheep, the nation of Israel were to follow God. Instead of wandering around aimlessly, they were to follow and obey God Almighty. The Jewish leaders and teachers were supposed to be leading the nation in worship of Almighty God, but were not doing so. Hence God in 10:3 being enraged at those who were in positions of trust who were deceivers, liars and only looking out for their own interests. Ezekiel 34 expounds this out in much further detail! So who were the people of Israel to follow? They were to follow the coming Messiah. Not only was the Messiah a King, Prophet Servant and Disciple but He would also be a Shepherd: the Good Shepherd! From the lowliest tribe of Judah, will come this Good Shepherd "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, being small among the clans of Judah, out of you one will come forth to me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting." (Micah 5:2) The Messiah Cares This Good Shepherd will be utterly reliable, responsible, faithful and being the sure foundation that the people of Israel need, particularly in a time of crisis. In 10:4 God will send this Good Shepherd to also be a cornerstone, nail or tent peg, battle bow and a source of all ruling authority. Cornerstone: all ancient buildings needed a chief cornerstone to ensure a sure foundation so that the building could not fall down easily. It held two walls together. The imagery fits in well with the building of the Temple. If you want to continue worshipping God, then you must get the foundations right. The chief cornerstone of the building holds the building together. Not only that, it gives the building shape, strength and all other stones are adjusted by it. Nail: Another translation is that of tent-peg. Just as the chief cornerstone holds the building together, so does a tent-peg ensure that the tent stays fastened down during storms! This Good Shepherd would ensure that everything is held together if they stick to Him. Battle-bow: Probably referring back to 9:13, Zechariah now likens this Messiah Shepherd to a battle-bow! This Good Shepherd will fight to keep the wolves from harming His sheep. He will battle for them. This Good Shepherd will be brave, courageous and strong as he leads his people to victory! How is Jesus this Messiah? Jesus said in Matthew 7:7-8 "Ask, and it will be given you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds. To him who knocks it will be opened." In other words, ask of God your heavenly Father and your needs will be supplied! That was how Jesus lived and obeyed, by being in constant communication with God the Father. That is how he could live a life of utter obedience to God, because He always asked, sought and knocked. What is more, Jesus is the Good Shepherd, hence Him saying in John 10:11 "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." Again in John 10:14-17 "I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and I'm known by my own; even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep, which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear my voice. They will become one flock with one shepherd. Therefore the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again." Jesus is the Good Shepherd only through the sacrifice he must make for His sheep. Here Jesus is looking ahead to the sacrifice He makes on the Cross. His love for all of humanity compels Him to make the ultimate sacrifice. Just as all shepherds will endanger themselves for the safety of their sheep, so too will Jesus endure the pain and suffering of the Cross, so that people can be led into safety of God's kingdom. It is in this role of the Good Shepherd, that Jesus exhibits true leadership, which is self-less and sacrificial. E zekiel 34:11 tells of God searching out for his sheep among all nations, and this is fulfilled through Jesus. Through His perfect, obedient and voluntary sacrifice on the Cross, not only will salvation be available to the Jews but also to those of other nations. And Jesus is willing to fight for His people! He gives spiritual armour for all those who follow Him to wear. Christians are in a spiritual battle reminds Paul in Ephesians 6, and as the Good Shepherd, Jesus will fight and battle for us through His indwelling Holy Spirit! For as the Bible says in 1 John 4:4 "You are of God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world." Jesus Christ is, as Peter reminds us in 1 Peter 2:8, the Cornerstone of faith - referring back to Isaiah 8:14. Jesus Christ is the dependable, sure foundation that all faith is to be ground upon. All Christians are living stones, but should be living on the dependability of Jesus Christ the chief cornerstone alone! It is only Him, who can give direction, assurance and be relied upon. It is Him that calls all people everywhere to seek for, turn to and follow obediently. Jesus Christ, Servant King, Servant Prophet, Servant Disciple, Servant Shepherd. Follow Him as the great leader He is and victory is assured! Whatever you are struggling with today, turn it over to God and ask for His help! He has promised to help! Remember that the battle belongs to the Lord! Amen! Just as Jesus said to Peter in John 21:19 "Follow Me!", so Jesus calls all those willing to follow Him, to follow Him for life. Follow and be led by Him and Him alone, regardless of what and where that might be. Right mouse click or tap here to save this Podcast as a MP3.

In Luke 6:46–49 we come to the end of Jesus' sermon the plain. Here Jesus confronts us with a question: will we build our house with a foundation on rock or with no foundation at all? There's no in-between when the floodwaters of life come. We may have said, "Lord, Lord," but if we have stopped with words then we will not be safe on that day. Jesus calls his disciples to make a hard break from the world, including the worldly false religion that obeys man and discards Jesus' words.

Our study with Dr. Mitchell begins in 1st Peter chapter 2 verses 3 and 4. In these verses Dr. Mitchell speaks about why we grow as we are nourished up on the word of God. Here Jesus is spoken of as a living stone, a cornerstone, chosen and precious by God. Peter quotes Isaiah 28:16 where God the Father Himself says, "Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame." The one who Believes in and trusts Christ Jesus is being built up as a spiritual house and will never be put to shame or disappointed by God our Father. What an encouragement, is it not?! Let's turn with Dr. Mitchell to 1st Peter chapter 2 verse 4 here on the Unchanging Word Bible Broadcast.

We continue in the book of Mark with 8:1-21. Here Jesus does another miraculous feeding of a large crowd, yet many still completely miss what he's doing and who he is. We consider the faith (good, bad, and confused) of all involved. 11.17.2024 - Eyes to See Pastor Matthew McCleary, Associate Pastor Visit our website at www.fremontpres.org Email us at podcast@fremontpres.org

This week’s gospel starts with disciples obsessing over who will be closest to Jesus, leading to Jesus teaching his followers about God's take on importance and power. Here Jesus makes it explicit that the reversal of values in God's community is a direct challenge to the values of the dominant culture, where wielding power over […]

We're traveling through Matthew's gospel one verse at a time, and today we come back to chapter 23. Here Jesus is giving His final message before heading to the cross, and it might surprise you what He chose to talk about! It's a message of warning that we really need to hear today. Are you under the impression that you're to somehow live a religious life, in order to gain favor with God? Actually, that's a futile endeavor. Rather, God wants a relationship with you. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/621/29

This week we will continue studying Jesus' teaching to his disciples on the way to Jerusalem from Mark 10:1-16. Here Jesus will use the examples of marriage and children to reveal what should be at the heart of every true disciple. In this passage, we will also see how we can enter God's kingdom and address the hardness in our heart that separates us from God.

Jesus, out of His great love for us, invites us to cooperate with Him in His wondrous works of salvation. We offer Him only that which we have, no more and no less. He takes anything lacking in our offering and fills it with Himself accomplishing His great works. We see this in the testimony of Christ feeding the 4,000 men plus women and children. Here Jesus invites His disciples to cooperate with Him in the miraculous by offering the little they had. What might He do through each of us if daily we decide to participate in the great work of our Lord in the salvation of our souls and the souls of many?

Currently on the program, we're studying the gospel of Matthew. This account of the life and ministry of Jesus Christ has many enriching lessons for us, including a very important warning in chapter sixteen. Here Jesus warns us, Take heed of the leven of the Pharisees! These Pharisees were doing many religious things, but inside they were full of dead men's bones! They were hypocritical. And this sort of hypocrisy is alive and well, even in the church today. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/621/29

Facing some opposition or obstacles in your daily walk? That's to be expected, but how do we respond to it as God would have us? We're about to find out today on a Daily Walk through a study of Matthew chapter ten. Here Jesus is preparing His disciples for what's ahead, and we stand to benefit from this valuable instruction. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/1368/29

Today we'll spend the bulk of our time together in Matthew chapter thirteen, and verses 33-35. Here Jesus gives us a parable about Leaven, and raises our awareness to a great deception that is in our midst. And it's false doctrine that comes from within the church. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/621/29

Wow, can you imagine witnessing Jesus' glory? That would change how you view Jesus. Today, Pastor Ken describes Jesus' bold attack against Satan during the Transfiguration. Here Jesus showed His disciples that He was God. When we think about Jesus, do we see Him as God? Many times, we see Jesus as our own private good luck charm. We carry Him around and use Him as we wish. Let's instead experience transformation by seeing Him in all His glory.

Today we get back into our study of Matthew, and we left off in the middle of chapter twelve. Here Jesus is healing a lot of people. From a man with a withered hand, to many who were ill, and even a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute as we'll hear today! To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/621/29

Going Above and Beyond Like King Jesus For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall be saved by His life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. -Romans 5:10-11 Matthew 5:43-48 Going Above and Beyond LIKE King Jesus This is the last of the 6 times Jesus says, “You have heard it said, but I say to you.” Interestingly, it is the first of the specific things this sermon says Christians will be rewarded for, with 4 more coming in chapter 6. The command they had corrupted V. 43 You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord. -Lev. 19:17-18 The words “hate your enemy” were not in the Old Testament. But that is how many of them had been taught to process Leviticus 19:18 by their leaders – Love your JEWISH neighbors, but hate your PAGAN enemies. When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God. -Lev. 19:33-34 The command to love includes loving your enemies V. 44 The word love occurs 640 times in the Bible (227 times in the NT). The word for love here is Agapeo (G25), which occurs in 110 verses. It means to feel and exhibit esteem and goodwill to a person, to prize and delight in a thing. Here Jesus commands Agape love for all people, even enemies. The word translated love is agape, which means a strong commitment of goodwill towards another regardless of whether or not they deserve it. -African Study Bible If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink, for you will heap burning coals on his head, and the LORD will reward you. -Proverbs 25:21-22 Reasons we are to love our enemies V. 45-48 We love our enemies not because of who they are but because of who God is (v 45) “Loving enemies requires such an unnatural response that obeying it proves who belongs to God.” -David Jeremiah We love our enemies because of who we once were, because of who we are now in Christ, and who they can become if they turn to Christ (v. 46-47) If you who call yourself Christians still practice “tribal love” for your own rather than love for people of “all tribes,” there is no practical difference that shows the eternal difference Jesus Christ makes. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. -Galatians 2:20 We love our enemies because doing so leads to growth and reward (v 48) The word for perfect is teleios (G5046), which occurs in 17 New Testament verses – it can be translated perfect, complete, mature, having reached its end, fulfilled its purpose. The fact is you and I won't reach full ‘perfection' until we are in Heaven, but our spiritual sights must be set on nothing less than living like Jesus by faith, striving to fulfill our God-given purpose through the power of the Holy Spirit. Here Jesus introduces the word reward back into the mix, as He did back in verse 12 – the sermon on the mount has the first reference to reward in the New Testament, and the most references to reward in the N.T. Jesus spoke these words to call believers living in this age of grace, this church age, to live like He lived, and to love like He loved! A new standard for reward – loving like Jesus loved, even your enemies!

Fourth Sunday of Easter – BApril 21, 2024 Hello and welcome to the Word, bringing you the Good News of Jesus Christ every day from the Redemptorists of the Baltimore Province. I am Fr. Karl Esker from the Basilica of our Lady of Perpetual Help in Brooklyn, NY. Today is the Fourth Sunday of Easter.Our reading today is taken from the holy gospel according to John.            Jesus said: "I am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. A hired man, who is not a shepherd and whose sheep are not his own, sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away, and the wolf catches and scatters them. This is because he works for pay and has no concern for the sheep. I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I will lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. These also I must lead, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one flock, one shepherd. This is why the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own. I have power to lay it down, and power to take it up again. This command I have received from my Father."The gospel of the Lord.Homily The principal image in this Sunday's readings comes from the gospel, where Jesus proclaims: “I am the good shepherd.” This is one of the favorite images people have of Jesus and many homes have pictures or statues of Jesus as the good shepherd protecting his flock and holding a sheep in his arms or carrying it on his shoulders. But that peaceful image does not fit well with his pronouncement today: “A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” Jesus willingly gathers us together, but at great cost to himself. And we ourselves, as his flock, are not supposed to just sit passively under his protection, but are called to actively enter into the mission he received from God the Father. That is the whole question of knowing, which in the scriptures goes beyond intellectual knowledge to include sharing of life. So, when Jesus says: “I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father,” he is sharing his life with us so that we can enter into the same relationship with God that he has. And that, too, has its cost, because Jesus repeats: “and I will lay down my life for the sheep.” It is not enough to just follow after Jesus, we must also become like Jesus.  We know Pope Francis' famous phrase that the shepherd should smell like the sheep. Here Jesus almost turns that around; the sheep should smell like Jesus. Just as the Son of God took on our humanity in everything but sin., we need to become more and more like Jesus.  We see that in the reading from Acts. Just as Jesus was hauled before the Jewish court to give an accounting of his preaching and miracles, now Peter is hauled before that same court, the Sanhedrin, to give an accounting of his healing of a cripple and subsequent preaching Jesus' name. The same one who denied Jesus three times, now openly declares, “There is no salvation through anyone else, nor is there any other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved," before the very ones who condemned Jesus to death. In the inspiring words of his letter, John tells the believers that they are God's children now, but more awaits them: “we shall be like him, for we shall see him as his is.” In the meantime, we are called to live, suffer and witness with and in Christ Jesus. So that we don't think of ourselves too special as Jesus' flock, he also says: “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. These also I must lead, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one flock, one shepherd.”  I pray that the joy and peace of our lives in Christ be an invitation to others to know and follow our Lord and Savior. May God bless you.Fr. Karl E. Esker CSsRBasilica of Our Lady of Perpetual HelpBrooklyn, NY

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 that you, the God of love, the living and loving God, sent your son Jesus Christ to live the life that we were supposed to live, he did it in our stead, and to die the death that we deserve to die for our law breaking. Jesus, we thank you that through your resurrection on that third day, on that first Sunday, the first resurrection day, you triumph over Satan's sin and death. The greatest enemies, our greatest enemies were placed as a foothold under your feet. Lord Jesus, we thank you that you are the life and the resurrection. You promise that whoever believes in you, though he die, will pass into eternal life. We thank you for the promise of the resurrection, that in the resurrection we will rise with glorified bodies, transformed bodies. We pray, Lord, that you continue to establish us by the power of the Holy Spirit in your will in obedience of faith.We thank you for the Holy Scriptures, Lord, and as we meditate on how Christ read the Scriptures, how he revered the Scriptures, how he submitted to them, I pray that you make us some people who love the holy Word of God and make us some people that long to be truly devout, sincere in our faith, knowing that your opinion of us is the one that matters most. Lord, make us the people that hate hypocrisy, hate hypocrisy within ourselves, that distance between what we show to the world and what we are inside and make us the people of integrity, integrated within loving you with all of our heart, with all of our strength, with all of our mind and strength. Lord bless our time, the Holy Word. We pray this in Christ's name, amen.We're continuing our sermon series through the Gospel of Mark called the Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom, Kingdom Come. The title of sermon today is Love God and Hate Lies. You've seen the yard sign, "Hate has no home here." Well, then God has no home there because God hates, and that sign hates God. God hates because God is love. Because he is love, there are things that he hates. In Proverbs 6:16-19 it says, "There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are in abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers."Our God is a God of perfect holiness; therefore, he must hate evil to remain in perfect holiness. And our God is a God of infinite love; therefore, he must hate that which destroys the object of his love lest he isn't loving. To love is to hate. To love God is to hate Satan. To love good is to hate evil. Proverbs 8:13 says, "The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance in the way of evil and perverted speech I hate." Or Romans 12:9, "Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good." So to love truth, we must hate lies.Psalm 119:163 says, "I hate and abhor falsehood, but I love your law." To love God's word is to hate any perversion of it, any adulteration of it, and to love the Gospel is to hate any false gospel. Galatians 1:8-9, "But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed." Strong words.A false gospel dishonors the person and the work of Christ, and Christ is the supreme object of God's love, the supreme display of his infinite goodness, and the one who accomplishes God's ultimate purpose to display his glory. In false gospels, they lead people away from Christ and the gospel by which they may be saved and enjoy forgiveness of sin, new life, and eternal happiness with God. God's love for people leads him to a place where he does hate that which leads them astray, which destroys them. And that's sin. God hates sin. In addition to its ugliness and opposition to the beauty of his holiness, sin ruins people. Therefore, loving God who loves people, he hates that which ruins them. True love hates that which hurts the object of God's love. To love sincerity is to hate hypocrisy. That's what we see in our text today, that Jesus hates hypocrisy. To conform to the image of Jesus Christ is to love what he loves and hate what he hates. Jesus loves God's Word; therefore, we are to love God's Word. Jesus loves the bride, the church; therefore, we are to love the church as Jesus did.Today we're in Mark 12:35-44. Would you look at the text with me? "And as Jesus taught in the temple, he said, 'How can the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David?' David himself and the Holy Spirit declared, 'The Lord said to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand until I your enemies under your feet. David himself calls him Lord. So how is he his son?"' And the great throng heard him gladly. And in his teaching he said, 'Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, who devour widows' houses and for a pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.'And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins which make a penny. He called his disciples to him and said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.'" This is the reading of God's holy and errant and fallible authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts.Three points to frame up our time. First, love the Scriptures like Jesus; second, hate hypocrisy like Jesus; and third, love sacrificial devotion like Jesus. First, love the Scriptures like Jesus. Having vanquished his opponents in a series of verbal duels against the synagogue, the Sanhedrin, the scribes of the Sanhedrin, we see this in Chapter 11, Chapter 12, he silenced the crowd. He silenced the religious establishment, the religious leaders. We know that through entering Jerusalem to the adulation of the crowds who cried out "Hosanna!" Then by entering the temple courtyard and driving out the merchants and the money changers, Jesus is throwing down the gauntlet. "Sanhedrin religious leaders, what are you going to do with the one who claims that he is the son of David, with the one who claims that the Messiah is here?"Through his actions, Jesus is messing with the support and the cash flow of the Sanhedrin. So they confront him publicly, and privately they plot to kill him. Jesus overturns their tables, and now he turns the tables against them. After a day of them questioning him, now he questions them with the question of the day. And the question is, "Is Jesus Lord? If Jesus is Lord, Sanhedrin, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to submit to Christ as Lord?" This is Verse 35, "As Jesus taught in the temple, he said, 'How can the scribes say that the Christ is the Son of God?'" In the Greek where it says, "He taught in the temple," it says, "He answered," meaning, he's answering their silence. He has silenced them. They should have then humbled themselves and said, "Lord, we humble ourselves underneath your authority and the teaching of Scripture," But that's not what they do. So he now answers their proud silence by asking them a question.Jesus had already entered Jerusalem in triumph. He has been hailed as the vanguard of David's restored dominion. This is the Messiah. He's here. The people have accepted him. Now Jesus is asking, "How can the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David?" He used the word Christ, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word for messiah, the one who is anointed to be king. Jesus had accepted the Messianic praises. He is the son of David. But by asking this question and by starting this conversation, what Jesus is getting at is, is the messiah only the son of David? Because if the messiah is only the son of David, then the messiah is only king of Israel. That's what they thought. That's what Israel thought that the messiah is going to be. Because David was the greatest king Israel ever had, the messiah is David's son; therefore, the messiah is going to be a king just like David, a king of only Israel.This is where they wrongly assumed that God was the God of only Israel, that God was the God of only their people, only their nation. So Jesus here is expanding the definition of the messiah by asking, "How can the messiah be only David's son?" What the people could not see is that while Jesus came as Israel's Messiah, he didn't come to save Israel from Rome. He didn't come to save them from the occupying forces. He didn't come to restore Israel to their former glory. He came to save them. He came to save them from their sins, but not just them, also people from every tribe, tongue, and nation. Their expectations were not too high for the Messiah. They were too low. The scribes of Jesus' day interpreted the messianic prophecies to mean that Israel's messiah would be a biological descendant of David and a great king to return Israel to its greatness.This makes all the more surprising what happens next. Jesus goes on the offensive, not against pagans, but against Jewish scribes who teach that the messiah is simply the son of David. So Jesus in Verse 36 says, "David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared, 'The Lord said to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet."'" Here King Jesus quotes Psalm 1:10, which was authored by David, but Jesus doesn't say, "David himself declared." He says, "David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared." Here Jesus is revealing how he viewed Scripture, how he viewed the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament, as we call it, that the Holy Spirit is the one that penned the Scriptures through David, through the authors.Here we see the Holy Trinity. The Spirit is writing through King David, and then it says the Lord, that first Lord in the Hebrew is Yahweh, that's God the Father, and the second Lord is Adonai, which is Lord, which is Jesus Christ. So God the Father says to God the Son, "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet." We have the Holy Trinity right there in that text.But how does this inform your understanding of Holy Scripture? Do you view Holy Scripture as Jesus did that it was written by the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. 2 Peter 1:16 says, "For we do not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father and the voice was born to him by the Majestic Glory, 'This is my beloved son with whom I'm well pleased,' we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns in the morning, star rises in your hearts, 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."I find J.C. Ryle's comments here extremely relevant. He says the following, "Let us learn in the first place from these verses how much there is about Christ in the Old Testament Scriptures. Our Lord desires to expose the ignorance of the Jewish teachers about the true nature of the Messiah." He does it by referring to a passage in the Book of Psalms and showing that the scribes did not rightly understand it. In so doing, he shows us that one subject about which David was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write was Christ. We know from our Lord's own words in another place that the Old Testament Scriptures testify of Christ, John 5:39, "They were intended to teach men about Christ by types and figures and prophecy until he himself should appear on Earth."We should always keep this in mind in reading the Old Testament, but never so much as in reading the Psalms. Christ is undoubtedly to be found in every part of the law in the prophets, but nowhere is he so much to be found as in the Book of Psalms. His experience and sufferings as first coming into the world, his future glory and his final triumph as second coming are the chief subjects of many a passage in that wonderful part of God's word. It is a true saying that we should look for Christ quite as much as David in reading the Psalms.Let us beware of undervaluing or despising the Old Testament. In its place and proportion, the Old Testament is just as valuable as the New. There are probably many rich passages in that part of the Bible which have never yet been fully explored. There are deep things about Jesus in it, which many walk over like hidden gold mines and know not the treasures beneath their feet. Let us reverence all the Bible. All is given by inspiration and all is profitable. One part throws light upon another, and no part can ever be neglected without loss and damage to our souls. A boastful contempt for the Old Testament Scriptures has often proved the first step towards infidelity.So as Jesus quotes Psalm 110, one thing to note is that the New Testament quotes Psalm 110 more than any other text from the Old Testament. 33 times it quotes Psalm 110. I'll read the whole passage of Psalm 110:1, "The Lord says to my Lord, 'Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.' The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your enemies! Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power in holy garments; from the womb of the morning, the dew of your youth will be yours. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, 'You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.' The Lord is at your right hand; he shall shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses; he shall shatter chiefs over the wide earth. He will drink from the brook by the way; and therefore he will lift up his head." So the same Lord that is referred to in Verse 1 is also referred to in Verse 4. There we read, "The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek."So we see here that not only is the Lord on the throne, not only is the Lord the King, but he's also the priest. He's not a priest according to the order of Levi. He's a priest according to the order of Melchizedek. So whoever this Messiah is, yes, he's the son of David, but he's so much greater. His dignity is so much more profound because he is eternal. He's an eternal priest, an eternal king. "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet." The messiah was thought to be a biological ancestor of David. Yet, David here is saying, "No, the Messiah is greater than I am, much more exalted than I am." Possesses a far greater dignity than David's own. In fact, David calls the Messiah, "My Lord," and Jesus' question is here, "How is the son of David called Lord by David?"That's the question of Verse 37. "David himself calls him Lord. So how is he his son? And the great throng heard him gladly." The logic seems to be that no father calls a child or calls a son Lord. Therefore, if David calls the Messiah Lord, is it appropriate to call the Messiah just the son of David? How can the Messiah fulfill these prophecies about an eternal Messiah if he is simply David's son? This is what Jesus here is questioning. He's not denying his physical descent from King David. No. Jesus is from the tribe of Judah. He is the Lion of Judah.What he's saying is, "I need to expand your definition of the messiah." He's not just the son of David. He's not just the messiah for Israel. He's also the Son of God. That's why David calls his son Lord. By asking this provocative question, Jesus is letting the people know he's the Lord. He's the Lord that David referred to. Yes, he's the son of David. He's also the Son of God. If he is David's Lord, then his messianic mission cannot be limited simply to restoring the nation of Israel to its former greatness.Jesus' kingdom is not of this world; therefore, his kingdom is for the whole world. Jesus isn't just king of the Jews. He's not just king of Israel. He's not just king of Christians. He is king over everything. The question is, are we going to submit to him here and now and say, "Lord Jesus, I'm yours. I want to serve you. I love you. What would you have me do?" or do we wait until all of the enemies of Jesus Christ will be placed under his feet, including those who reject the gospel in this life?The irony is that David's Lord and descendant is standing in the very same temple which was designed to point Israel to Jesus Christ, and they don't recognize him. Although the people were amazed at his words, they definitely didn't fully understand what Jesus is saying. If they had, in a few days they would not have cried out, "Crucify him!" They heard him greatly. They received him gladly. Romans 1:3-4 makes this clear that Jesus is both the son of David and the Son of God. "...concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of in by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord."In the next passage, Jesus will impugn the characters of the scribes in the Sanhedrin, accusing them bluntly of oppressing and of their hypocrisy. Meaning, they mouth the words, "Yes, Lord. Yes, you're Yahweh. Yes, you're Adonai," but deep inside they had no love for the Lord, and therefore, they were hypocrites. Jesus shows us how much he hates hypocrisy. In point two: hate hypocrisy like Jesus. Psalm 97:10, "O you who love the Lord, hate evil! He preserves the lives of his saints; he delivers them from the hand of the wicked." One of the greatest forms of evil is hypocrisy because hypocrisy is evil masquerading as good. It's lies masquerading as truth. It's wolves in sheep clothing. How odious is the sin of hypocrisy in the sight of Jesus, so he says in Verse 38, "Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts."This is the irony of ironies that those who claim to love God the most, who claim to love the law of God the most, who view themselves as the guardian and defenders of the faith didn't know God. They didn't want the blessings of God as much as they wanted the trappings that came with religious service. They claimed to be zealots for God, but they devoted themselves entirely to presenting themselves as righteous, presenting themselves as holy. These men may strive to please God in some sense, but they love the perks of holiness. They love walking around in their flowing robes, receiving the greetings of the people, taking the seats of honor, talking as if they know the Lord when they don't.Then Jesus exposes that they're actually using this front, this façade, this posturing as a means to evil gain. When Jesus says, "Beware of the scribes," he's not just saying, "Okay, beware of those religious people out there." He's saying, "Beware of the same hypocrisy in their heart, beware of that same hypocrisy in your own." Hypocrisy is so dangerous because it's lies that people begin to believe themselves. It's self-delusion. If you think you're right with God, if you think you're righteous, if you think you're a good person, you start to begin believing that, and you want to be around people who think you're righteous. This is exactly what these people were doing. In an honor-conscious, Greco-Roman society, these distinctions about the robes and the seats and the positions of honor and the greetings, there were important signs of status. What Jesus is saying that that's what was most important to them than the delight of God the Father.Then Mark 12:40, "... who devour widows' houses and for pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation." They were devourers of the good of the poor saying they did so on the grounds of justice, but in reality they were destroying those on the fringes. Here Jesus rips off the scribes' mask of respectability to reveal the brutal, even demonic reality underneath. We see this in the words, "They love to be at feasts," where there was civilized dining, and then when no one's looking, they're devouring the houses of the widows. The same word for devour was used only one other time in Mark, in Mark 4:4 where Satan comes like the bird to eat the Word of God, the seed of the Word of God. These very pillars of society, men distinguished as such by dress and universal acclaim, they're revealed to be demonic abusers of the helpless, and then they use prayer as a means of veiling their assaults.To add insult to injury, in the book of Deuteronomy, the Levites were included along with the widows, the orphan, and the resident aliens as people who require societal support. So the Levites, they didn't own land, and because they didn't have land ownership, they relied on the people and the gifts of the people for their sustenance. But instead of relating to the widow and the orphan and the resident alien, they betrayed a sacred trust. They violated it and defrauded them. This is particularly heinous in the eyes of the Lord because God loves the widow, and he loves the orphan, and he loves the resident alien.The widow's house was often the sum total of her inheritance. That's all she had. What these scribes did was they would go to the widow and they'd say, "Well, have you paid your tithes to the temple? Oh, we see you have not." Then through their legalese, they would take the house away from the widow, and they would say, "We're giving it to the Lord." How does the Lord view this? He said they're going to receive great condemnation. They're going to receive God's justice. If you do not repent of your sin, justice will come down upon you for this law-breaking, for this heinous crime. The Old Testament often threatens with judgment those who oppress widows, orphans, and other helpless persons.The Lord hates defrauding. He hates robbing. If you've ever been robbed, if you've ever been defrauded, you know that feeling of violation. I was actually surprised by this. A neighbor ran up to me a little while back. He said, "Have you seen my daughter's bicycle?" They had parked it in the back of the condominium association, and then someone came and just took the bicycle. This is a very established, even-keeled gentleman. I will never forget the look of disgust as if he was violated. It's just a bicycle. Well, people defraud all the time, that we live in an evil world. The Lord sees and the Lord will bring justice. We as believers, we are to be thankful to the Lord for that, that the Lord hates evil and he will judge it. The question we got to ask, is there evil in my life, in my heart that the Lord hates, that the Lord wants to condemn? If so, I need to repent.That's how you battle hypocrisy. You battle hypocrisy by saying, "Lord, yes, I present myself as a follower of Christ, but when I get on my knees, I know my sin, I know my evil and you know it as well. Lord, forgive me. Lord give me grace and help me put this evil to death." These were people that used evil as... They used the excuse that good will come or we'll take the houses. We're going to build up the temple. Saint Paul writes in Romans 3:8, "Why not do evil that good may come? As some people slanderously charged us with saying, 'Their condemnation is just.'"Isaiah 10 makes this practice of the scribes as they oppress the widows clear. Isaiah 10:1, "Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be their spoil and that they may make the fatherless their prey! What will you do on the day of punishment in the ruin that will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help and where will you leave your wealth? Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisoners or fall among the slain. For all this, his anger has not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still."The oppressors are said to defraud their victims with evil writs or iniquitous decrees or documents, documents that would come from a scribe. They would seize the property because they said, "Look, according to our documents, you haven't paid the tithes, so we're taking it." Jesus Christ, he hates this hypocrisy, he hates this injustice, he hates this evil, and above all else, he hates the fact that these people presented themselves as righteous and they're using their pseudo-righteousness as a cover for evil.The Lord reserved his strongest language, his strongest and heaviest denunciations against hypocrisy. Yes, it's bad enough to be led away and captive to open sin and to serve diverse lusts and pleasures, but it's even worse to pretend like you're having a living faith, but in reality, you serve the world. So we as believers, we have to be aware, "Beware," Jesus says, "of falling into this abominable sin, beware of ever putting on a cloak of hypocrisy." Let us be real, honest, thorough, and sincere in our following of Christ. We can trick people for a little while, but we will never trick God. God is not mocked. He's the discerner of the thoughts and intentions of the heart and his all-seeing eye pierces through the varnish, the tinsel which cover the unsound heart.Having predicted judgment of the scribes who devour widows' houses, Jesus now turns his gaze to an impoverished widow. He's sitting there watching as she gives, and he commends her for her generosity. The two passages are meant to be taken together. They're an illustration of the age-old motif of the two ways. There's two ways. You can either pretend to be a follower of the Lord but deep down inside it's just corruption and sin, or the path is offered to be like this widow where she is serving the Lord. No one sees, she thinks. It's all hidden, and her poverty is matched by her generosity. So we are to be careful to, yes, believe the right things but also live our lives in a way that our lives adorn the doctrine of Christ.This brings us to the third point: love sacrificial devotion like Jesus, Verse 41, "He sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums." It says he sat down, and the sitting could be significant, especially after Jesus just claimed to be the Lord sitting at the right hand of Yahweh, and he sits opposite the treasury. Most exegesis say this treasury is part of the Woman's Court that had 13 brass receptacles shaped like trumpets. You would come up to the brass receptacle that's shaped like a trumpet, and you'll put your coins in. There was no paper currency at the time. So when people threw the coins in, the more coins, the bigger the coins, the heavier the coins, the more noise they made.When this poor widow brings her money, there's not much noise. Verse 42, "A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny." This is the least valuable of the Roman coins, the smallest coin in circulation. She's giving all she has, but it's not much. Jesus is there. He's watching and he's sitting. Verse 43, "He called his disciples to him and said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box.'" All those contributing, Jesus is using that phrase collectively, that this one widow gave more, according to Jesus, than everyone else combined.Why? Because of Verse 44, "They all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on." All she had to live on, that phrase is even her whole living. The word bios is used. It literally means life. She's given all she has. She's given her life, everything she had for her life. The crucial thing we learned is not the quantity that gives, but the scarcity from which one gives, what's subsequently left over. It's more commendable to give out of poverty than out of abundance, according to the Lord.I do want to point out that the Lord notices. The most sacrifices that we make for the Lord, no one sees, but the Lord does see, and the Lord does notice, and the Lord does keep track. The depth of the widow's sacrifice is emphasized by the repetition at the end. "She gives everything she has." When the rich young ruler came to Jesus Christ and said, "How can I obtain eternal life? How can I inherit eternal life?" Jesus says, "Go sell all that you have, all that you have." Here she gives all that she has.One thing to point out is, on the one hand, Jesus excoriates the Sanhedrin and the temple and the institution in this corruption. On the other hand, he points to this precious soul within the institution that doesn't know about all of the corruption. She's giving out of her love for the Lord. We see this example all throughout the Scriptures. In the Book of Luke, we see Zechariah, Elizabeth, Simeon, Anna, all who go to the temple to pray as expressions of their piety. But then also in the Book of Acts, we see Stephen get up and preach a sermon in which he excoriates the temple and predicts its destruction by God.So it is possible to recognize the corruption of an institution, the venality of its officers, at the same time to admire the piety of the simple souls who devote themselves to an innocent faith. Jesus' point is that what sinful men and women regard as piety like the scribes did, well, Jesus doesn't really care about that. The scribes had their robes and they had their seats and they had their greetings. They thought they gave a lot to the Lord. But the Lord is saying he cares more about the precious state of the heart of this woman. When the kingdom of God comes in power, God reverses everything sinful. Yet, religious people think about what God expects.This week I celebrated my birthday. Someone asked me, "What'd you do?" I said, "I did my favorite thing. I did nothing." That's my favorite thing. I went for a walk. Then we had Raising Cane's with my girls in the evening. It was a very nice. Raising Cane's shout out with the secret sauce. Then my daughters gave me a little gifts, little note cards. My youngest daughter gives me this card that she drew. It's beautiful. "Dad, you're the best dad ever," thank you, thank you, and a big picture, beautiful, we're holding hands.Then I open it up. There's a dollar bill inside. I was like, "No way!" I was like, "A dollar bill?" I'm looking at it, I was like, "It's a dollar bill. Baby, do you know inflation? Come on. It's not worth anything. You can't buy a thing." Maybe that's why she gave it to me. "Dad, I know inflation." No, she's in the first grade. She doesn't know about that. It's all she had. This is like her greatest treasure. "I'm six. What can I get my dad? I'm going to make him a card, and I'm going to give him my net worth. Here you go, a dollar." I'm never going to spend that dollar. I've got it on my mantle. I'm never going to spend it. It's so precious to me.That's what the Lord is saying. God looks at the heart. God notices not how much, but from how much. God does not look at the size of the gift but the dimensions of the sacrifice behind it. God looks at the heart of the giver. The depth of the widow's sacrifice is emphasized by the repetition at the end. "She gives everything she has, even her whole living all of her life." The widow is a fitting conclusion to the Lord's public ministry and is called to discipleship. Jesus said, "This is what it means to follow me. You take up your cross, deny yourself daily, and follow me." Here she is, a true disciple because she's lost her life for his sake, as Jesus says all true disciples will do.He, like her, will also give everything he has for the temple, but not the second temple, but the third temple. With his sacrifice on the cross, he's redeeming for himself a new people. Through those people, he creates a temple of the Spirit of God and a sanctuary not made by hands. This combination of self-sacrifice and eschatological construction will confound human ways of knowing. Jesus raises this contrast not to encourage us to give all that we have away, but rather to make the point that true piety, true faithfulness, true following of the Lord will often go unnoticed. True devotion will often go unnoticed because it's unassuming, because it's private.True piety is not a matter of mere external conformity to the law. Rather, true piety results from that faith to trust God to provide no matter what because he is a good God. But as Jesus insists, true righteousness isn't a matter of just outward demonstration. It's all about the heart. Then ultimately, we don't... Even with this widow, even this widow needed a righteousness that is not her own. She needed someone to die for her sins, to ransom her from the condemnation that we deserve. That's exactly what Jesus will do on the cross.So who is the Lord? Well, he is David's son, and he is also David's Lord. In other words, our Lord Jesus Christ here is saying that he is the Lord that demands that we love him with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind. In the previous text, the scribe says, "What's the greatest commandment?" and Jesus says, "Here O Israel, the Lord our God. The Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind." In our text, Jesus says, "I'm the Lord. Yahweh says to me, 'Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.'"So what Jesus here is saying is that he is the ultimate object of worship. The fact that Jesus of Nazareth was and is Almighty God is the single fact that unlocks the secret of your existence and the secret of the existence of every human being. It is the single reason why we as Christians have every right, not just right, every duty, obligation, we have every right and duty to say that every human being must become a Christian, every human being must become a follower of Christ. It's for this reason that Jesus, the first century man, has no rivals. He has no successors. His life is unique and it is final.If you make the crucial discovery that Jesus is God, you can't avoid the conclusion that all of the other religions are not true. That Islam, which regards Jesus just as a prophet, but not even the ultimate prophet, that Islam and, for that matter, Judaism or Buddhism or any other human religion or philosophy is wrong at the very key point. They may be right about many things, but they're wrong about the most essential point. It is the fact that Jesus Christ is God that makes the Christian faith true and all the other religions and philosophies false at the bottom.In this text, we have two mysteries for the price of one. We have the plurality of the persons within the unity of the Godhead. We have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and we have the union of the Godhead and the manhood in the person of Jesus. He is the son of David; therefore, he is fully man. He is the Son of God; therefore, he is God himself. But mysterious as all this may be, the logic is clear and the logic is irresistible. If Jesus is God and died for the sins of the elect and obviously that and only that is the way of salvation, Jesus is the only way that we can be reconciled with God.For someone who has embraced Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, the fact that he is both God and man makes him unquestionably deserving of our absolute and unquestioning loyalty. There's only two ways. Either you love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind in this age, either you love Jesus Christ; or you are his enemy and you will be placed under his feet for all eternity. If you're not sure, today we urge you, we plead with you, turn to Jesus Christ in your heart of hearts in prayer and say, "Lord Jesus, forgive me for my sins. You are Lord. I am not. I have sinned. And Lord Jesus, forgive me. Give me grace and make me a person that is fully devoted to you no matter the sacrifice."1 Corinthians 12:3, "Therefore, I want you to understand that no one's speaking in the spirit of God ever says 'Jesus is accursed!' and no one can say, 'Jesus is Lord" except in the Holy Spirit." Then the concluding words of 1 Corinthians 16:22, "If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love be with you all in Christ Jesus. Amen."Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this text and we thank you that you are a God who loves us; therefore, you hate sin. On the cross, Lord, we see both your love for us in that you sent your Son, Jesus Christ, to pay the penalty for our sin. We also see your hatred of sin as you pour out your wrath on your Son as he bore our sins, the penalty for our sins. Lord Jesus, we pray that you continue to make us the people that love you, love your word, love the truth, and hate lies. Make us the people who long to be sincere in our walk with you. Make us the people who hate hypocrisy, beginning with the hypocrisy that's so close to our hearts. The Holy Spirit, continue to build us up as your church, the church of Jesus Christ. Continue to draw the elect and continue to use us powerfully as a witness here in the city. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

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 that you, the God of love, the living and loving God, sent your son Jesus Christ to live the life that we were supposed to live, he did it in our stead, and to die the death that we deserve to die for our law breaking. Jesus, we thank you that through your resurrection on that third day, on that first Sunday, the first resurrection day, you triumph over Satan's sin and death. The greatest enemies, our greatest enemies were placed as a foothold under your feet. Lord Jesus, we thank you that you are the life and the resurrection. You promise that whoever believes in you, though he die, will pass into eternal life. We thank you for the promise of the resurrection, that in the resurrection we will rise with glorified bodies, transformed bodies. We pray, Lord, that you continue to establish us by the power of the Holy Spirit in your will in obedience of faith.We thank you for the Holy Scriptures, Lord, and as we meditate on how Christ read the Scriptures, how he revered the Scriptures, how he submitted to them, I pray that you make us some people who love the holy Word of God and make us some people that long to be truly devout, sincere in our faith, knowing that your opinion of us is the one that matters most. Lord, make us the people that hate hypocrisy, hate hypocrisy within ourselves, that distance between what we show to the world and what we are inside and make us the people of integrity, integrated within loving you with all of our heart, with all of our strength, with all of our mind and strength. Lord bless our time, the Holy Word. We pray this in Christ's name, amen.We're continuing our sermon series through the Gospel of Mark called the Gospel of Mark and the Secret of God's Kingdom, Kingdom Come. The title of sermon today is Love God and Hate Lies. You've seen the yard sign, "Hate has no home here." Well, then God has no home there because God hates, and that sign hates God. God hates because God is love. Because he is love, there are things that he hates. In Proverbs 6:16-19 it says, "There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are in abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers."Our God is a God of perfect holiness; therefore, he must hate evil to remain in perfect holiness. And our God is a God of infinite love; therefore, he must hate that which destroys the object of his love lest he isn't loving. To love is to hate. To love God is to hate Satan. To love good is to hate evil. Proverbs 8:13 says, "The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance in the way of evil and perverted speech I hate." Or Romans 12:9, "Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good." So to love truth, we must hate lies.Psalm 119:163 says, "I hate and abhor falsehood, but I love your law." To love God's word is to hate any perversion of it, any adulteration of it, and to love the Gospel is to hate any false gospel. Galatians 1:8-9, "But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed." Strong words.A false gospel dishonors the person and the work of Christ, and Christ is the supreme object of God's love, the supreme display of his infinite goodness, and the one who accomplishes God's ultimate purpose to display his glory. In false gospels, they lead people away from Christ and the gospel by which they may be saved and enjoy forgiveness of sin, new life, and eternal happiness with God. God's love for people leads him to a place where he does hate that which leads them astray, which destroys them. And that's sin. God hates sin. In addition to its ugliness and opposition to the beauty of his holiness, sin ruins people. Therefore, loving God who loves people, he hates that which ruins them. True love hates that which hurts the object of God's love. To love sincerity is to hate hypocrisy. That's what we see in our text today, that Jesus hates hypocrisy. To conform to the image of Jesus Christ is to love what he loves and hate what he hates. Jesus loves God's Word; therefore, we are to love God's Word. Jesus loves the bride, the church; therefore, we are to love the church as Jesus did.Today we're in Mark 12:35-44. Would you look at the text with me? "And as Jesus taught in the temple, he said, 'How can the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David?' David himself and the Holy Spirit declared, 'The Lord said to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand until I your enemies under your feet. David himself calls him Lord. So how is he his son?"' And the great throng heard him gladly. And in his teaching he said, 'Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, who devour widows' houses and for a pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.'And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins which make a penny. He called his disciples to him and said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.'" This is the reading of God's holy and errant and fallible authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts.Three points to frame up our time. First, love the Scriptures like Jesus; second, hate hypocrisy like Jesus; and third, love sacrificial devotion like Jesus. First, love the Scriptures like Jesus. Having vanquished his opponents in a series of verbal duels against the synagogue, the Sanhedrin, the scribes of the Sanhedrin, we see this in Chapter 11, Chapter 12, he silenced the crowd. He silenced the religious establishment, the religious leaders. We know that through entering Jerusalem to the adulation of the crowds who cried out "Hosanna!" Then by entering the temple courtyard and driving out the merchants and the money changers, Jesus is throwing down the gauntlet. "Sanhedrin religious leaders, what are you going to do with the one who claims that he is the son of David, with the one who claims that the Messiah is here?"Through his actions, Jesus is messing with the support and the cash flow of the Sanhedrin. So they confront him publicly, and privately they plot to kill him. Jesus overturns their tables, and now he turns the tables against them. After a day of them questioning him, now he questions them with the question of the day. And the question is, "Is Jesus Lord? If Jesus is Lord, Sanhedrin, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to submit to Christ as Lord?" This is Verse 35, "As Jesus taught in the temple, he said, 'How can the scribes say that the Christ is the Son of God?'" In the Greek where it says, "He taught in the temple," it says, "He answered," meaning, he's answering their silence. He has silenced them. They should have then humbled themselves and said, "Lord, we humble ourselves underneath your authority and the teaching of Scripture," But that's not what they do. So he now answers their proud silence by asking them a question.Jesus had already entered Jerusalem in triumph. He has been hailed as the vanguard of David's restored dominion. This is the Messiah. He's here. The people have accepted him. Now Jesus is asking, "How can the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David?" He used the word Christ, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word for messiah, the one who is anointed to be king. Jesus had accepted the Messianic praises. He is the son of David. But by asking this question and by starting this conversation, what Jesus is getting at is, is the messiah only the son of David? Because if the messiah is only the son of David, then the messiah is only king of Israel. That's what they thought. That's what Israel thought that the messiah is going to be. Because David was the greatest king Israel ever had, the messiah is David's son; therefore, the messiah is going to be a king just like David, a king of only Israel.This is where they wrongly assumed that God was the God of only Israel, that God was the God of only their people, only their nation. So Jesus here is expanding the definition of the messiah by asking, "How can the messiah be only David's son?" What the people could not see is that while Jesus came as Israel's Messiah, he didn't come to save Israel from Rome. He didn't come to save them from the occupying forces. He didn't come to restore Israel to their former glory. He came to save them. He came to save them from their sins, but not just them, also people from every tribe, tongue, and nation. Their expectations were not too high for the Messiah. They were too low. The scribes of Jesus' day interpreted the messianic prophecies to mean that Israel's messiah would be a biological descendant of David and a great king to return Israel to its greatness.This makes all the more surprising what happens next. Jesus goes on the offensive, not against pagans, but against Jewish scribes who teach that the messiah is simply the son of David. So Jesus in Verse 36 says, "David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared, 'The Lord said to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet."'" Here King Jesus quotes Psalm 1:10, which was authored by David, but Jesus doesn't say, "David himself declared." He says, "David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared." Here Jesus is revealing how he viewed Scripture, how he viewed the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament, as we call it, that the Holy Spirit is the one that penned the Scriptures through David, through the authors.Here we see the Holy Trinity. The Spirit is writing through King David, and then it says the Lord, that first Lord in the Hebrew is Yahweh, that's God the Father, and the second Lord is Adonai, which is Lord, which is Jesus Christ. So God the Father says to God the Son, "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet." We have the Holy Trinity right there in that text.But how does this inform your understanding of Holy Scripture? Do you view Holy Scripture as Jesus did that it was written by the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. 2 Peter 1:16 says, "For we do not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father and the voice was born to him by the Majestic Glory, 'This is my beloved son with whom I'm well pleased,' we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns in the morning, star rises in your hearts, 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."I find J.C. Ryle's comments here extremely relevant. He says the following, "Let us learn in the first place from these verses how much there is about Christ in the Old Testament Scriptures. Our Lord desires to expose the ignorance of the Jewish teachers about the true nature of the Messiah." He does it by referring to a passage in the Book of Psalms and showing that the scribes did not rightly understand it. In so doing, he shows us that one subject about which David was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write was Christ. We know from our Lord's own words in another place that the Old Testament Scriptures testify of Christ, John 5:39, "They were intended to teach men about Christ by types and figures and prophecy until he himself should appear on Earth."We should always keep this in mind in reading the Old Testament, but never so much as in reading the Psalms. Christ is undoubtedly to be found in every part of the law in the prophets, but nowhere is he so much to be found as in the Book of Psalms. His experience and sufferings as first coming into the world, his future glory and his final triumph as second coming are the chief subjects of many a passage in that wonderful part of God's word. It is a true saying that we should look for Christ quite as much as David in reading the Psalms.Let us beware of undervaluing or despising the Old Testament. In its place and proportion, the Old Testament is just as valuable as the New. There are probably many rich passages in that part of the Bible which have never yet been fully explored. There are deep things about Jesus in it, which many walk over like hidden gold mines and know not the treasures beneath their feet. Let us reverence all the Bible. All is given by inspiration and all is profitable. One part throws light upon another, and no part can ever be neglected without loss and damage to our souls. A boastful contempt for the Old Testament Scriptures has often proved the first step towards infidelity.So as Jesus quotes Psalm 110, one thing to note is that the New Testament quotes Psalm 110 more than any other text from the Old Testament. 33 times it quotes Psalm 110. I'll read the whole passage of Psalm 110:1, "The Lord says to my Lord, 'Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.' The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your enemies! Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power in holy garments; from the womb of the morning, the dew of your youth will be yours. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, 'You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.' The Lord is at your right hand; he shall shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses; he shall shatter chiefs over the wide earth. He will drink from the brook by the way; and therefore he will lift up his head." So the same Lord that is referred to in Verse 1 is also referred to in Verse 4. There we read, "The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek."So we see here that not only is the Lord on the throne, not only is the Lord the King, but he's also the priest. He's not a priest according to the order of Levi. He's a priest according to the order of Melchizedek. So whoever this Messiah is, yes, he's the son of David, but he's so much greater. His dignity is so much more profound because he is eternal. He's an eternal priest, an eternal king. "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet." The messiah was thought to be a biological ancestor of David. Yet, David here is saying, "No, the Messiah is greater than I am, much more exalted than I am." Possesses a far greater dignity than David's own. In fact, David calls the Messiah, "My Lord," and Jesus' question is here, "How is the son of David called Lord by David?"That's the question of Verse 37. "David himself calls him Lord. So how is he his son? And the great throng heard him gladly." The logic seems to be that no father calls a child or calls a son Lord. Therefore, if David calls the Messiah Lord, is it appropriate to call the Messiah just the son of David? How can the Messiah fulfill these prophecies about an eternal Messiah if he is simply David's son? This is what Jesus here is questioning. He's not denying his physical descent from King David. No. Jesus is from the tribe of Judah. He is the Lion of Judah.What he's saying is, "I need to expand your definition of the messiah." He's not just the son of David. He's not just the messiah for Israel. He's also the Son of God. That's why David calls his son Lord. By asking this provocative question, Jesus is letting the people know he's the Lord. He's the Lord that David referred to. Yes, he's the son of David. He's also the Son of God. If he is David's Lord, then his messianic mission cannot be limited simply to restoring the nation of Israel to its former greatness.Jesus' kingdom is not of this world; therefore, his kingdom is for the whole world. Jesus isn't just king of the Jews. He's not just king of Israel. He's not just king of Christians. He is king over everything. The question is, are we going to submit to him here and now and say, "Lord Jesus, I'm yours. I want to serve you. I love you. What would you have me do?" or do we wait until all of the enemies of Jesus Christ will be placed under his feet, including those who reject the gospel in this life?The irony is that David's Lord and descendant is standing in the very same temple which was designed to point Israel to Jesus Christ, and they don't recognize him. Although the people were amazed at his words, they definitely didn't fully understand what Jesus is saying. If they had, in a few days they would not have cried out, "Crucify him!" They heard him greatly. They received him gladly. Romans 1:3-4 makes this clear that Jesus is both the son of David and the Son of God. "...concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of in by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord."In the next passage, Jesus will impugn the characters of the scribes in the Sanhedrin, accusing them bluntly of oppressing and of their hypocrisy. Meaning, they mouth the words, "Yes, Lord. Yes, you're Yahweh. Yes, you're Adonai," but deep inside they had no love for the Lord, and therefore, they were hypocrites. Jesus shows us how much he hates hypocrisy. In point two: hate hypocrisy like Jesus. Psalm 97:10, "O you who love the Lord, hate evil! He preserves the lives of his saints; he delivers them from the hand of the wicked." One of the greatest forms of evil is hypocrisy because hypocrisy is evil masquerading as good. It's lies masquerading as truth. It's wolves in sheep clothing. How odious is the sin of hypocrisy in the sight of Jesus, so he says in Verse 38, "Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts."This is the irony of ironies that those who claim to love God the most, who claim to love the law of God the most, who view themselves as the guardian and defenders of the faith didn't know God. They didn't want the blessings of God as much as they wanted the trappings that came with religious service. They claimed to be zealots for God, but they devoted themselves entirely to presenting themselves as righteous, presenting themselves as holy. These men may strive to please God in some sense, but they love the perks of holiness. They love walking around in their flowing robes, receiving the greetings of the people, taking the seats of honor, talking as if they know the Lord when they don't.Then Jesus exposes that they're actually using this front, this façade, this posturing as a means to evil gain. When Jesus says, "Beware of the scribes," he's not just saying, "Okay, beware of those religious people out there." He's saying, "Beware of the same hypocrisy in their heart, beware of that same hypocrisy in your own." Hypocrisy is so dangerous because it's lies that people begin to believe themselves. It's self-delusion. If you think you're right with God, if you think you're righteous, if you think you're a good person, you start to begin believing that, and you want to be around people who think you're righteous. This is exactly what these people were doing. In an honor-conscious, Greco-Roman society, these distinctions about the robes and the seats and the positions of honor and the greetings, there were important signs of status. What Jesus is saying that that's what was most important to them than the delight of God the Father.Then Mark 12:40, "... who devour widows' houses and for pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation." They were devourers of the good of the poor saying they did so on the grounds of justice, but in reality they were destroying those on the fringes. Here Jesus rips off the scribes' mask of respectability to reveal the brutal, even demonic reality underneath. We see this in the words, "They love to be at feasts," where there was civilized dining, and then when no one's looking, they're devouring the houses of the widows. The same word for devour was used only one other time in Mark, in Mark 4:4 where Satan comes like the bird to eat the Word of God, the seed of the Word of God. These very pillars of society, men distinguished as such by dress and universal acclaim, they're revealed to be demonic abusers of the helpless, and then they use prayer as a means of veiling their assaults.To add insult to injury, in the book of Deuteronomy, the Levites were included along with the widows, the orphan, and the resident aliens as people who require societal support. So the Levites, they didn't own land, and because they didn't have land ownership, they relied on the people and the gifts of the people for their sustenance. But instead of relating to the widow and the orphan and the resident alien, they betrayed a sacred trust. They violated it and defrauded them. This is particularly heinous in the eyes of the Lord because God loves the widow, and he loves the orphan, and he loves the resident alien.The widow's house was often the sum total of her inheritance. That's all she had. What these scribes did was they would go to the widow and they'd say, "Well, have you paid your tithes to the temple? Oh, we see you have not." Then through their legalese, they would take the house away from the widow, and they would say, "We're giving it to the Lord." How does the Lord view this? He said they're going to receive great condemnation. They're going to receive God's justice. If you do not repent of your sin, justice will come down upon you for this law-breaking, for this heinous crime. The Old Testament often threatens with judgment those who oppress widows, orphans, and other helpless persons.The Lord hates defrauding. He hates robbing. If you've ever been robbed, if you've ever been defrauded, you know that feeling of violation. I was actually surprised by this. A neighbor ran up to me a little while back. He said, "Have you seen my daughter's bicycle?" They had parked it in the back of the condominium association, and then someone came and just took the bicycle. This is a very established, even-keeled gentleman. I will never forget the look of disgust as if he was violated. It's just a bicycle. Well, people defraud all the time, that we live in an evil world. The Lord sees and the Lord will bring justice. We as believers, we are to be thankful to the Lord for that, that the Lord hates evil and he will judge it. The question we got to ask, is there evil in my life, in my heart that the Lord hates, that the Lord wants to condemn? If so, I need to repent.That's how you battle hypocrisy. You battle hypocrisy by saying, "Lord, yes, I present myself as a follower of Christ, but when I get on my knees, I know my sin, I know my evil and you know it as well. Lord, forgive me. Lord give me grace and help me put this evil to death." These were people that used evil as... They used the excuse that good will come or we'll take the houses. We're going to build up the temple. Saint Paul writes in Romans 3:8, "Why not do evil that good may come? As some people slanderously charged us with saying, 'Their condemnation is just.'"Isaiah 10 makes this practice of the scribes as they oppress the widows clear. Isaiah 10:1, "Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be their spoil and that they may make the fatherless their prey! What will you do on the day of punishment in the ruin that will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help and where will you leave your wealth? Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisoners or fall among the slain. For all this, his anger has not turned away, and his hand is stretched out still."The oppressors are said to defraud their victims with evil writs or iniquitous decrees or documents, documents that would come from a scribe. They would seize the property because they said, "Look, according to our documents, you haven't paid the tithes, so we're taking it." Jesus Christ, he hates this hypocrisy, he hates this injustice, he hates this evil, and above all else, he hates the fact that these people presented themselves as righteous and they're using their pseudo-righteousness as a cover for evil.The Lord reserved his strongest language, his strongest and heaviest denunciations against hypocrisy. Yes, it's bad enough to be led away and captive to open sin and to serve diverse lusts and pleasures, but it's even worse to pretend like you're having a living faith, but in reality, you serve the world. So we as believers, we have to be aware, "Beware," Jesus says, "of falling into this abominable sin, beware of ever putting on a cloak of hypocrisy." Let us be real, honest, thorough, and sincere in our following of Christ. We can trick people for a little while, but we will never trick God. God is not mocked. He's the discerner of the thoughts and intentions of the heart and his all-seeing eye pierces through the varnish, the tinsel which cover the unsound heart.Having predicted judgment of the scribes who devour widows' houses, Jesus now turns his gaze to an impoverished widow. He's sitting there watching as she gives, and he commends her for her generosity. The two passages are meant to be taken together. They're an illustration of the age-old motif of the two ways. There's two ways. You can either pretend to be a follower of the Lord but deep down inside it's just corruption and sin, or the path is offered to be like this widow where she is serving the Lord. No one sees, she thinks. It's all hidden, and her poverty is matched by her generosity. So we are to be careful to, yes, believe the right things but also live our lives in a way that our lives adorn the doctrine of Christ.This brings us to the third point: love sacrificial devotion like Jesus, Verse 41, "He sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums." It says he sat down, and the sitting could be significant, especially after Jesus just claimed to be the Lord sitting at the right hand of Yahweh, and he sits opposite the treasury. Most exegesis say this treasury is part of the Woman's Court that had 13 brass receptacles shaped like trumpets. You would come up to the brass receptacle that's shaped like a trumpet, and you'll put your coins in. There was no paper currency at the time. So when people threw the coins in, the more coins, the bigger the coins, the heavier the coins, the more noise they made.When this poor widow brings her money, there's not much noise. Verse 42, "A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny." This is the least valuable of the Roman coins, the smallest coin in circulation. She's giving all she has, but it's not much. Jesus is there. He's watching and he's sitting. Verse 43, "He called his disciples to him and said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box.'" All those contributing, Jesus is using that phrase collectively, that this one widow gave more, according to Jesus, than everyone else combined.Why? Because of Verse 44, "They all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on." All she had to live on, that phrase is even her whole living. The word bios is used. It literally means life. She's given all she has. She's given her life, everything she had for her life. The crucial thing we learned is not the quantity that gives, but the scarcity from which one gives, what's subsequently left over. It's more commendable to give out of poverty than out of abundance, according to the Lord.I do want to point out that the Lord notices. The most sacrifices that we make for the Lord, no one sees, but the Lord does see, and the Lord does notice, and the Lord does keep track. The depth of the widow's sacrifice is emphasized by the repetition at the end. "She gives everything she has." When the rich young ruler came to Jesus Christ and said, "How can I obtain eternal life? How can I inherit eternal life?" Jesus says, "Go sell all that you have, all that you have." Here she gives all that she has.One thing to point out is, on the one hand, Jesus excoriates the Sanhedrin and the temple and the institution in this corruption. On the other hand, he points to this precious soul within the institution that doesn't know about all of the corruption. She's giving out of her love for the Lord. We see this example all throughout the Scriptures. In the Book of Luke, we see Zechariah, Elizabeth, Simeon, Anna, all who go to the temple to pray as expressions of their piety. But then also in the Book of Acts, we see Stephen get up and preach a sermon in which he excoriates the temple and predicts its destruction by God.So it is possible to recognize the corruption of an institution, the venality of its officers, at the same time to admire the piety of the simple souls who devote themselves to an innocent faith. Jesus' point is that what sinful men and women regard as piety like the scribes did, well, Jesus doesn't really care about that. The scribes had their robes and they had their seats and they had their greetings. They thought they gave a lot to the Lord. But the Lord is saying he cares more about the precious state of the heart of this woman. When the kingdom of God comes in power, God reverses everything sinful. Yet, religious people think about what God expects.This week I celebrated my birthday. Someone asked me, "What'd you do?" I said, "I did my favorite thing. I did nothing." That's my favorite thing. I went for a walk. Then we had Raising Cane's with my girls in the evening. It was a very nice. Raising Cane's shout out with the secret sauce. Then my daughters gave me a little gifts, little note cards. My youngest daughter gives me this card that she drew. It's beautiful. "Dad, you're the best dad ever," thank you, thank you, and a big picture, beautiful, we're holding hands.Then I open it up. There's a dollar bill inside. I was like, "No way!" I was like, "A dollar bill?" I'm looking at it, I was like, "It's a dollar bill. Baby, do you know inflation? Come on. It's not worth anything. You can't buy a thing." Maybe that's why she gave it to me. "Dad, I know inflation." No, she's in the first grade. She doesn't know about that. It's all she had. This is like her greatest treasure. "I'm six. What can I get my dad? I'm going to make him a card, and I'm going to give him my net worth. Here you go, a dollar." I'm never going to spend that dollar. I've got it on my mantle. I'm never going to spend it. It's so precious to me.That's what the Lord is saying. God looks at the heart. God notices not how much, but from how much. God does not look at the size of the gift but the dimensions of the sacrifice behind it. God looks at the heart of the giver. The depth of the widow's sacrifice is emphasized by the repetition at the end. "She gives everything she has, even her whole living all of her life." The widow is a fitting conclusion to the Lord's public ministry and is called to discipleship. Jesus said, "This is what it means to follow me. You take up your cross, deny yourself daily, and follow me." Here she is, a true disciple because she's lost her life for his sake, as Jesus says all true disciples will do.He, like her, will also give everything he has for the temple, but not the second temple, but the third temple. With his sacrifice on the cross, he's redeeming for himself a new people. Through those people, he creates a temple of the Spirit of God and a sanctuary not made by hands. This combination of self-sacrifice and eschatological construction will confound human ways of knowing. Jesus raises this contrast not to encourage us to give all that we have away, but rather to make the point that true piety, true faithfulness, true following of the Lord will often go unnoticed. True devotion will often go unnoticed because it's unassuming, because it's private.True piety is not a matter of mere external conformity to the law. Rather, true piety results from that faith to trust God to provide no matter what because he is a good God. But as Jesus insists, true righteousness isn't a matter of just outward demonstration. It's all about the heart. Then ultimately, we don't... Even with this widow, even this widow needed a righteousness that is not her own. She needed someone to die for her sins, to ransom her from the condemnation that we deserve. That's exactly what Jesus will do on the cross.So who is the Lord? Well, he is David's son, and he is also David's Lord. In other words, our Lord Jesus Christ here is saying that he is the Lord that demands that we love him with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind. In the previous text, the scribe says, "What's the greatest commandment?" and Jesus says, "Here O Israel, the Lord our God. The Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind." In our text, Jesus says, "I'm the Lord. Yahweh says to me, 'Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.'"So what Jesus here is saying is that he is the ultimate object of worship. The fact that Jesus of Nazareth was and is Almighty God is the single fact that unlocks the secret of your existence and the secret of the existence of every human being. It is the single reason why we as Christians have every right, not just right, every duty, obligation, we have every right and duty to say that every human being must become a Christian, every human being must become a follower of Christ. It's for this reason that Jesus, the first century man, has no rivals. He has no successors. His life is unique and it is final.If you make the crucial discovery that Jesus is God, you can't avoid the conclusion that all of the other religions are not true. That Islam, which regards Jesus just as a prophet, but not even the ultimate prophet, that Islam and, for that matter, Judaism or Buddhism or any other human religion or philosophy is wrong at the very key point. They may be right about many things, but they're wrong about the most essential point. It is the fact that Jesus Christ is God that makes the Christian faith true and all the other religions and philosophies false at the bottom.In this text, we have two mysteries for the price of one. We have the plurality of the persons within the unity of the Godhead. We have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and we have the union of the Godhead and the manhood in the person of Jesus. He is the son of David; therefore, he is fully man. He is the Son of God; therefore, he is God himself. But mysterious as all this may be, the logic is clear and the logic is irresistible. If Jesus is God and died for the sins of the elect and obviously that and only that is the way of salvation, Jesus is the only way that we can be reconciled with God.For someone who has embraced Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, the fact that he is both God and man makes him unquestionably deserving of our absolute and unquestioning loyalty. There's only two ways. Either you love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind in this age, either you love Jesus Christ; or you are his enemy and you will be placed under his feet for all eternity. If you're not sure, today we urge you, we plead with you, turn to Jesus Christ in your heart of hearts in prayer and say, "Lord Jesus, forgive me for my sins. You are Lord. I am not. I have sinned. And Lord Jesus, forgive me. Give me grace and make me a person that is fully devoted to you no matter the sacrifice."1 Corinthians 12:3, "Therefore, I want you to understand that no one's speaking in the spirit of God ever says 'Jesus is accursed!' and no one can say, 'Jesus is Lord" except in the Holy Spirit." Then the concluding words of 1 Corinthians 16:22, "If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love be with you all in Christ Jesus. Amen."Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this text and we thank you that you are a God who loves us; therefore, you hate sin. On the cross, Lord, we see both your love for us in that you sent your Son, Jesus Christ, to pay the penalty for our sin. We also see your hatred of sin as you pour out your wrath on your Son as he bore our sins, the penalty for our sins. Lord Jesus, we pray that you continue to make us the people that love you, love your word, love the truth, and hate lies. Make us the people who long to be sincere in our walk with you. Make us the people who hate hypocrisy, beginning with the hypocrisy that's so close to our hearts. The Holy Spirit, continue to build us up as your church, the church of Jesus Christ. Continue to draw the elect and continue to use us powerfully as a witness here in the city. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Phil continued our sub-series The Mission of Jesus with a sermon from John 10 on the abundant life. Here Jesus states that one of the reasons he came was so that his followers might have life, and life to the full. Phil put forth some key principles of what an abundant life looks like based on the shepherding language used in this chapter.

Dr. Richard Schmidt is the Pastor of Union Grove Baptist Church and also heads Prophecy Focus Ministries. He is the speaker on the WVCY-TV program Prophecy Focus and the radio program Prophecy Unfolding. Prior to his current pastoral ministry, he spent 32 years in law enforcement including becoming Acting Sheriff of Milwaukee County in 2017 until his retirement in 2019. He is the author of several books including the one being discussed today, Tribulation to Triumph- The Olivet Discourse.--For thousands of years, mankind has been fascinated with the question of what will happen in the future. For answers people turn to their local neighborhood palm reader shop. Some follow their daily horoscope. Psychics abound on many television channels, by telephone, and online. Just type the word -psychic- into a search engine and in half a second, 230 million responses will come up.--There is great interest in the future. However, one place that people have refused to look at is the pages of Scripture. Jesus Himself was asked by his disciples about future events. Our program today focuses primarily on two chapters of Scripture- Matthew 24 and 25. Here Jesus addresses this important issue in what has been coined -the Olivet Discourse.-