Podcast appearances and mentions of judah ben hur

In this episode, hosts Cam & Dylan take a deep dive into the cinematic colossus that is Ben-Hur (1959) — the epic historical drama that defined an era of filmmaking. From chariot races to betrayal, vengeance to redemption, the guys break down what made this film a monumental achievement in Hollywood history. Directed by William Wyler and starring Charlton Heston, Ben-Hur swept the Oscars with a record-setting 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor. Based on the 1880 novel by Lew Wallace, the film tells the powerful story of Judah Ben-Hur, a Jewish prince betrayed by his Roman friend and forced into slavery, only to seek revenge and find spiritual awakening in the time of Christ. Cam & Dylan go beyond the surface with their signature mix of hot takes, humor, and behind-the-scenes trivia. Whether you're a fan of old-school epics or just love hearing passionate movie talk, this one's got xtra butta all over it.

Four Play's new Sword-and-Sandal arc takes us back to the age of Hollywood epics with 1959's legendary Ben-Hur. The film weaves in the birth of Christianity into the background of the heartbreaking story of the titular character Judah Ben-Hur, played by the legendary Charlton Heston. The most expensive movie ever made when it released, Ben-Hur achieves a scope of sets, costumes, extras, and an iconic chariot racing sequence almost unrivaled in cinema history. The movie remains one of the most influential ever made and a must-watch for understanding the history of film and appreciating its breathtaking scope. Control Body Odor ANYWHERE with Mando and get $5 off off your Starter Pack (that's over 40% off) with promo code FOURPLAY at https://www.shopmando.com! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dana and Tom with returning guest, Peterson W. Hill (Co-Host of the War Starts at Midnight podcast), and new guest, Kristin Battestella (Critic for In Session Film, Search Magazine, and Keith Loves Movies) discuss the epic Best Picture Winner Ben-Hur (1959) for its 65th anniversary: directed by William Wyler, written by Karl Tunberg, music by Miklos Rozsa, starring Charleton Heston, Jack Hawkins, Haya Harareet, and Stephen Boyd.Plot Summary: In an ancient world, nobleman Judah Ben-Hur is betrayed by his friend Messala, a Roman officer, and is cast into slavery. Judah endures brutal hardships, fueled by a burning desire for vengeance. He rises through sheer will and becomes a skilled charioteer, aided by Sheik Ilderim and his magnificent horses.In a climactic race, Judah defeats Messala, reclaiming his honor. Along his journey, he encounters the Nazarene, whose teachings of love and forgiveness transform Judah's quest from one of retribution to spiritual awakening. Thus, Judah's tale becomes a timeless legend of courage, redemption, and grace.Chapters:00:00 Welcome and Guest Introductions01:45 Getting to Know - Kristin Battestella04:19 Cast and Recognition for Ben-Hur08:11 Relationship(s) with Ben-Hur17:20 What is Ben-Hur About?25:29 Oscar Legacy and Cultural Impact29:27 Plot Summary for Ben-Hur30:29 Did You Know?32:40 First Break33:28 What's Up with Kristin and Peterson35:02 Ask Dana Anything36:47 Best Performance(s)53:38 Best/Favorite/Indelible Scene(s)01:02:27 Second Break01:03:21 In Memoriam01:04:48 Best/Funniest Lines01:08:11 The Stanley Rubric - Legacy01:16:57 The Stanley Rubric - Impact/Significance01:19:34 The Stanley Rubric - Novelty01:22:45 The Stanley Rubric - Classicness01:28:15 The Stanley Rubric - Rewatchability01:38:07 The Stanley Rubric - Audience Score and Final Total01:39:22 Remaining Questions for Ben-Hur01:46:50 Thank You to Our Guests01:51:18 CreditsYou can also get this episode in full video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/c99i7UBy9KoYou can now follow us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, or TikTok (@gmoatpodcast).For more on the episode, go to: https://www.ronnyduncanstudios.com/post/ben-hur-1959-ft-peterson-w-hill-and-kristin-battestellaFor the entire rankings list so far, go to: https://www.ronnyduncanstudios.com//post/greatest-movie-of-all-time-listKeywords:Ben-Hur, film analysis, cinematic techniques, character analysis, cultural impact, rewatchability, legacy, themes, performances, directionRonny Duncan Studios

An adaptation of Lew Wallace’s classic novel of Judah Ben-Hur, a 1st Century Jewish man unjustly imprisoned by the decree of his ambitious best friend.

Falsely accused and imprisoned for years, Judah Ben Hur returns to exact his revenge. Join me as I discuss the 1959 Best Picture Oscar winner: Ben Hur

The 1959 Ben Hur is epic not only in scale, but also in spiritual depth. Follow the exile and redemption of Judah Ben Hur, and feel the tension between faithfulness and idolatry, vengeance and forgiveness.

A discussion of an absolute classic. Instead of spending four hours of your life on the film, find out all about it here as we discuss: depictions of Christ in film, Civil War fan fiction, the narrative arc of epics, and the protagonist himself Judah Ben-Hur. Intro music: "Magne Pater" by Dominican Schola Cantorum. Outro music: "Your Long Journey" by Alison Krauss and Robert Plant.

De bloedbroeders Judah Ben-Hur, joodse prins, en Messala, Romeinse legerofficier, komen elkaar naar het leven te staan. Messala wil dat Judah anderen verklikt, wat hij weigert. De Romein veroordeelt de jood uit wraak tot een slavenbestaan op de galeien. Na pijnlijke ogenblikken die Juda verlossen van de galeien en zelfs tot in de paleizen van […]

In Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, set in the first century, the protagonist is a Jewish prince by the name of Judah Ben-Hur. Romans occupy Palestine, and a group called the Zealots plots their overthrow on the grounds of religious objection and national pride. Judah for his part wants to find a peaceful solution, and his conscience prevents him from joining with his countrymen planning an armed insurrection. But when Judah is approached by his boyhood friend, the ambitious Roman officer Messala, and asked for help identifying the conspirators, here too his conscience prevents him from participating. And for this, Judah finds himself in short-order framed for the crime of trying to assassinate the Roman governor of Judea, and he and his mother and sister are together accused, convicted, and sentenced to be made examples of. Yes, Ben-Hur is a revenge story after a fashion. But it's also a story about personal conviction and conscience resisting false choices; it's also a story of religious liberty. As Yuval Levin writes in an article for First Things from 2016 titled 'The Perils of Religious Liberty,' "Religious liberty, in this view, is therefore not quite a liberal liberty. It is not a freedom to do what you want, but a freedom to do what you must. It describes a duty of society to retreat and give its members space to act on what they deem essential; an acknowledgment not of a human liberty or right, but of a human obligation that precedes the social obligation and so shapes it." Let's apply this mode of thinking to the abortion debate, then. It is not enough for someone to say that their religion or lack thereof is silent on the question of when life begins, or what life is worthy of living, or whether murder is always wrong. Rather, freedom of religion rightly conceived would ask whether we have an obligation before God to relate to the unborn by either aborting them or defending their right to life. All the while, the position of the Christian is that we will one day give an account for both our active and passive parts played in such matters. With abortion, then, the Christian insistence on making illegal this particular kind of murder is predicated on the conviction that we will give an account to our Maker for how we treat men, women, and children of all ages who are made in His image and therefore ultimately belong to Him. To give a counter-example, consider the question of the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Ratified by the states on January 16, 1919 and taking effect on January 17, 1920, that law of the land said that both the production and sale of liquor was illegal. And doubtless its proponents held the view that the ends of less public drunkenness and more engaged husbands, fathers, employees, and parishioners justified whatever means necessary to ensure the public good. Still today, among some of my relatives, the conviction is staunch and unwavering that where drunkenness and alcoholism are both physically and morally unacceptable, unhealthy, ungodly, and foolish, the only correct course for a person of upright and Christian character is to abstain entirely. Where God's Word tells us to not be drunk, we must not even have a drop. Therefore, anyone who does partake even in moderation is even sinning and should therefore be shunned. Here too, however, the principle of religious liberty must come to bear. And the question ought to be whether we have an obligation before God to act in such a way as we will be able to give an honorable account to the Judge of all mankind concerning. The freedom to partake, abstain, or prohibit is not enough to go on. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/garrett-ashley-mullet/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/garrett-ashley-mullet/support

Tick, tick, tick, tick…the constant click of a metronome could conceivably drive a person crazy. I am now - although I wasn't always - a metronome fan. Though this may sound crazy to some of you, the metronome is my favorite practice tool because it helps me fix errors, create flow and it gives me time to play a piece or a tricky passage correctly. I realize that this may not be your experience with the metronome. Maybe your feeling about it is more like this: If you've seen the classic movie Ben Hur, you already know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, let me set the scene for you. At one point in the tale, our hero Judah Ben Hur is a galley slave on a Roman ship, chained to an oar with several other slaves. The entire hold of the ship is filled with men chained to oars; they are the engine of the ship. In order for the slaves to generate enough power to move the ship, it is essential that they row in a coordinated way. So at the front of the galley is a man beating a drum. He sets the tempo for the rowers. When the ship enters into battle, the drummer picks up the pace. Slaves collapse left and right trying to keep up. Does this sound like your metronome experience, only without the sweat and starvation? Apparently, this depiction isn't historically accurate, but it may be accurate enough if your metronome feels like a slave driver. Actually the Latin word used in the movie for the drummer is hortator. Our word “exhort” meaning to urge or advise comes from the same root. Hortator can also mean encourager. You may not be ready to think of your metronome as a friendly encourager just yet, but I hope to give you a glimpse of that today. We'll talk about the best use of the metronome - and it's NOT for speeding up - plus I will share two of my favorite ways to use the metronome to help me play more musically. Even better, if you've never been able to use a metronome before, you'll learn exactly how to do it. That's right. I will actually teach you how to work with your metronome and why it's important. Stick with me here; I can pretty much guarantee you will love this. Links to things I think you might be interested in that were mentioned in the podcast episode:  90 Goals Plan Free PDF Related resource: 12 Ways to Use Your Metronome to Create Time blog post Harpmastery.com Get involved in the show! Send your questions for future podcast episodes to me at podcast@harpmastery.com LINKS NOT WORKING FOR YOU? FInd all the show resources here: https://www.harpmastery.com/blog/Episode-050

This week the guys welcome back to the studio esteemed friend and mentor Dr. Ken Bratt. You may remember him from such episodes as "From there We Travelled to Philippi" (AN46). An expert in material culture, Ken leads us on an historical and archaeological tour of the catacombs around Rome. We stop off at San Callisto, San Sebastian, and touch on a few of the lesser-known spots as we learn of pagan, Jewish, and Christian burial. Did Christians really worship in these catacombs with Judah Ben Hur, or is that simply more Hollywood folderol? What about the adaptation of pagan art forms for Christian burials, mastedons and mammoths, and the veracity of relics? Along the way we learn how St. Sebastian, though perforated like a pincushion, headed back to rebuke Diocletian (Die Hardest?). And your intestinal fortitude will be tested once again by one's of Dave's most egregious puns.

Welcome to part one of our 1959 Oscars Series, where we explore one of the most celebrated films of all time, the 1959 Biblical Epic Ben-Hur. In the second Charlton Heston movie we've covered, Judah Ben-Hur goes on an epic journey of revenge against a childhood friend turned mortal enemy. Dominating the Oscars in 1959, this film stands as one of the most awarded films of all time. Join us for part two where we compare Ben-Hur to another famous movie from the 1959 Oscars season.   As a side note, sorry for the poorer audio quality. As new podcasters we're still trying to work out all the kinks!   Where to watch: Ben-Hur - movie: where to watch streaming online (justwatch.com)

This month, Izzy, Vincent and Mark discuss the films that have been made... and then made again, this time with Oscar-winning success. Mutiny on the Bounty stars Clark Gable and Charles Laughton as mutineer Christian Fletcher and the infamous, harsh Captain Bligh as they set sail to Tahiti on HMS Bounty. William Wyler's Ben Hur is a true epic that contains one of the most famous action sequences of all time - the chariot race in the grand circus. The plot follows Jewish prince Judah Ben-Hur as he is condemned into slavery by his best friend, and Roman, Messala. Charlton Heston stars as the titular character seeking vengeance. Thank you to Thomas Whitelaw for our intro music and Rachel Valentine Smith for our artwork. This episode was recorded remotely and so we apologise for any changes in sound quality present.

[English version below] Bhris ar m'fhoighne. Ní fhéadfainn é a sheasamh níos faide. Bhí an fhuil ag borradh i mo chuislí. rug mé ar shrian an chapaill amach as a dhá lámh. Sheas mé suas gcarr cosúil leis na fir eile. Ansin thugas laisc don chapall. Réab sí chun cinn. Ba bheag nár caitheadh siar amach as an gcarr mé leis iarracht. ‘Nois bhí sí sna cosa in airde agus muid ag breith suas ar na carranna eile. Bhí deannach ag éirí ó rothaí an chairr. Bhreathnaigh mé síos ar mo Dheaide ach ní hé a bhí ann anois ach Judah Ben-Hur é féin. Bhí meangadh ar a bhéal. “Shíl mé nach mbainfeá an srian amach as lámha t'athar go brách,” adeir sé. Láithreoir: Seán Ó Catháin Aíonna: Emily Barnes agus Eilís Everard [Leagan Gaeilge thuas] A collection of short stories by Mike P. Ó Conaola, in Irish. Presenter: Seán Ó Catháin Guests: Emily Barnes and Eilís Everard

“May God grant me vengeance. I pray you live until I return.” While not the most conventional way to say farewell to an old acquaintance, this remark by Judah Ben Hur to his childhood friend definitely makes sense under the circumstances. Formally a prince of Judea, Ben Hur and his family are wrongly accused and sentenced by the invading Roman legions as an example to those who would oppose the Empire. Judah Ben Hur must now use all his will and focus to stay alive and not only avenge this wrong, but find his mother and sister. Sharing the title for Most Oscar Wins Ever, Ben Hur remains an epic undertaking, both to film and to watch, even to this day. Does it deserve the title? Find out this week on Cinema Cemetery!Current Rankings3- Lawerence of Arabia 4- All About Eve5- Gone With Wind 11-It Happened One Night12- The Bridge on the River Kwai19- All The King's Men20-The Lost Weekend22-On The Waterfront24. Casablanca25- All Quiet on the Western Front27-Rebecca30-The Mutiny on the Bounty34-You Can’t Take It With You 35-Marty36- Mrs. Miniver45-A Gentlemen's Agreement49-Hamlet50-Cimarron60-Best Years of Our Lives62-From Here to Eternity64- Around the World In 80 Days65-The Great Ziegfeld 70- Wings71-Grand Hotel77-Life of Emil Zola79- How Green Was My Valley80-An American in Paris85- Going My Way89-Greatest Show On Earth90 Broadway Melody91-Cavalcade92-Gigi

William Wyler's 1959 adaptation of General Lew Wallace's novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ is an epic in every sense of the word. It tells the story of Judah Ben-Hur, a Jewish aristocrat living in a time of Jesus Christ. When Judah and his childhood friend Messala disagree on the Roman Empire's presence in the Holy Land, it sets off a series of events that eventually culminate in one of the most incredible sequences ever put to film. Join with me as we discuss... --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/pageturnerstheywerenot/support

Ben-Hur, winner of ELEVEN Academy Awards including Best Picture 1959, is huge. Really. It is YUUUUUUGE. Big. Grand. Vast. Epic. There is a LOT going on here. Charlton Heston (Waynes World 2) stars as Judah Ben Hur, the Forrest Gump of Biblical times. Check out the episode!

On this episode, we discuss the thirty-second Best Picture Winner: “BEN-HUR.”"Ben-Hur" is an epic drama about an aristocratic Jew living in Judaea who incurs the wrath of a childhood friend, now a Roman tribune. Although forced into slavery on a galley and compelled to witness the cruel persecution of his family, he survives, harbouring dreams of vengeance. Directed by William Wyler, the film stars Charlton Heston as Judah Ben-Hur, Jack Hawkins as Quintus Arrius, Haya Harareet as Esther, Stephen Boyd as Messala, and Hugh Griffith as Sheik Ilderim.Here on The Envelope, we discuss & review every Best Picture Winner in the Academy Awards History. We are a Cinema Squad Production, presented on the Cinema Squad Podcast Channel. You can reach anyone here at TheCinemaSquad.com – Just go there to email us, check our bios, and keep up with the latest episode.

Når gammelt nag afgøres med stridsvogne i en arena fuld af sand og blod! Ben Hur (1959) af William Wyler. Den 12. film på Morten og Thomas liste over de 100 bedste film. Charlston Heston har hovedrollen i denne legendariske skildring af opgøret mellem den jødiske høvdinge søn Judah Ben Hur og romeren Messala. Fra den visse død som slave ved de romerske galejer, vender Judah Ben Hur tilbage for at tage hævn over sin gamle barndomsven, der har ødelagt hans familie. Vi møder Kristus, en hesteelskende arabisk sheik og et utal af sandaler og statister, hvor selv Kristus har en rolle at spille. Thomas og Morten tager snak om hvad der sker når skæbne, hævn og tilgivelse krydser klinger.

This week, we watch the epic tale of Judah Ben-Hur, a man who lived at the time of Jesus. Based on the outstandingly popular novel from 1880, and a remake of the 1925 film, this iteration of the tale is distinguished by winning the most Academy Awards in history, and has a number of other records held as well (largest set ever built, etc). Come for the chariot race, and stay for the mind blowing scale. Ben-Hur (1959), directed by William Wyler.

This week, we watch the epic tale of Judah Ben-Hur, a man who lived at the time of Jesus.  Based on the outstandingly popular novel from 1880, and a remake of the 1925 film, this iteration of the tale is distinguished by winning the most Academy Awards in history, and has a number of other records held as well (largest set ever built, etc).  Come for the chariot race, and stay for the mind blowing scale. Ben-Hur (1959), directed by William Wyler.

Notre épisode de Pâque livré pour vous avec un léger retard. Au menu: le drame de la NES Mini, Goof Troops, le nouvel album de The Smith Street Band, segment country avec Lillie Mae et retour sur Hearthstone. En prime, on parle de Judah Ben Hur et pourquoi vous n'avez rien manqué au Record Store Day.

Story: Durch eine Intrige seines Adoptivbruders Messala wird der angesehene und wohlhabende Judah Ben Hur von seiner Familie und seiner großen Liebe Esther getrennt und als Sklave auf eine römische Galeere gezwungen. Immer wieder mit dem Tod konfrontiert, reift in ihm ein alles bestimmender Gedanke: Rache zu nehmen an dem ehemals geliebten Bruder. Nach Jahren der Qual und Verzweiflung kehrt Ben Hur nach Jerusalem zurück und stellt sich in einem epochalen Wettkampf gegen den Verräter Messala und das gesamte römische Imperium. Kinostart: 01.09.2016 (Paramount Pictures Germany) Ben Hur Action, Abenteuer, Drama Land: USA 2016 Laufzeit: ca. 124 min. FSK: 12 Regie: Timur Bekmambetov Drehbuch: Keith R. Clarke, John Ridley Buch: Lew Wallace Mit Jack Huston, Morgan Freeman, Toby Kebbell, Nazanin Boniadi, Rodrigo Santoro, ... https://youtu.be/WsL2Hgg0B08

Story: Durch eine Intrige seines Adoptivbruders Messala wird der angesehene und wohlhabende Judah Ben Hur von seiner Familie und seiner großen Liebe Esther getrennt und als Sklave auf eine römische Galeere gezwungen. Immer wieder mit dem Tod konfrontiert, reift in ihm ein alles bestimmender Gedanke: Rache zu nehmen an dem ehemals geliebten Bruder. Nach Jahren der Qual und Verzweiflung kehrt Ben Hur nach Jerusalem zurück und stellt sich in einem epochalen Wettkampf gegen den Verräter Messala und das gesamte römische Imperium. Kinostart: 01.09.2016 (Paramount Pictures Germany) Ben Hur Action, Abenteuer, Drama Land: USA 2016 Laufzeit: ca. 124 min. FSK: 12 Regie: Timur Bekmambetov Drehbuch: Keith R. Clarke, John Ridley Buch: Lew Wallace Mit Jack Huston, Morgan Freeman, Toby Kebbell, Nazanin Boniadi, Rodrigo Santoro, ... https://youtu.be/WsL2Hgg0B08

Ben Hur är återigen aktuell på bioduken och Tobias Svanelid granskar filmen och dess föregångare. Dessutom om den romerska vattenorgeln, vars ljud nu återigen går att uppleva. Ben Hur är ett mediefenomen som fascinerat oss i mer än hundra år. Nu är en ny film aktuell, och Vetenskapsradion Historia granskar den senaste versionen av berättelsen om den judiske prinsen Judah Ben Hur som sätter sig upp mot det Romerska imperiet. Förutom några stigbyglar och alltför pampiga arenor så är det inte så mycket att invända mot när det gäller det historiska, men berättelsens ursprungstema tycks ha gått förlorad, menar antikvetaren Allan Klynne.Idag är det 3D-glasögon som gäller när ny Ben Hur-historia skall skapas. Men det mesta tyder på att den senaste filmen inte blir samma mediehistoriska milstolpe som mastodontfilmen från 1959, superdyra stumfilmen från 1925, teaterversionen från 1899 som fick 20 miljoner amerikaner att köpa biljett och ursprungsboken från 1880 som låg på bästsäljarlistorna i femtio år.Dessutom om den romerska vattenorgeln, som kanske kan ha varit Ben Hurs favoritinstrument. Nyligen gästades Sverige av en av världens få vattenorganister, Justus Willberg, som med sin rekonstruktion av en orgel från 200-talet hoppas kunna återskapa det romerska soundet.Programledare är Tobias Svanelid.

The epic story of Judah Ben-Hur, a prince falsely accused of treason by his adopted brother, an officer in the Roman army. After years at sea, Judah returns to his homeland to seek revenge, but finds redemption. We also discuss The Magnificent Seven trailer.

the story of Judah Ben-Hur, a wealthy Jewish prince living in Rome-occupied Jerusalem, as well as his strong competitive bond with his adopted Roman brother, Messala Severus, who will come to be his main adversary in that climactic race. However, that bond is put to the test when Messala becomes a centurion in the Roman military, eventually returning to Jerusalem as a captain entrusted to command the troops as Roman prefect to Judaea, Pontius Pilate, enters the city, which has been a trouble spot for Rome due to a faction of murderous zealots. When Judah refuses to name names to Messala prior to another eruption in Pilate's presence, he's convicted of sedition for the incident, effectively beginning his enslavement in the galley of a Roman warship, where he will presumably be shackled until he expires. The rest of the film concerns how Judah goes from that predicament to ultimately compete against his brother for guts and glory in the chariot race. Oh, and Jesus is in there somewhere too.

Well, for the next two weeks, we're going to be looking at this incredible passage of scripture that Chase just read, Ephesians 2:11-17. And it's a powerful text, I think, that gives us hope for some of the most poignant issues that are facing us even in this day. It's the only hope I think there is for racism, for dealing with the issues of racism in our country. We'll talk much more clearly and directly about that next week. But these problems of division in our world, and hatred, and hostility, and what this text calls a barrier dividing wall of hostility. These things can only be removed by the sovereign grace of God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They cannot be removed by diplomacy, or government regulations, or United Nations, or any of those things. Those barriers, those dividing walls of hostility, will not come down that way, but only through the Gospel of Christ. The only hope for unity in our world is the Gospel, and this morning we're going to zero in specifically on the division between Jews and Gentiles. The Jew-Gentile division in the scripture and what Christ has done for that. History of Conflict And I think the overwhelming majority of us who are here today, are Gentiles. There may be some of Jewish descent here, but the overwhelming majority of those that assemble on Sunday mornings to hear the good news of Christ, and to study the scriptures are Gentiles. And we need to hear what Paul is saying to us. What you just heard in the text. How it was for us as Gentiles. We need to understand the astounding work that Christ has done in bringing us as Gentiles, who were so far away from hope, so far away from God's work in redemption, in the world, and bringing us near in Christ, and we need to celebrate that. It's amazing. And this text has the power to do that. Paul here goes to the root of hatred and hostility between Jews and Gentiles, and shows us how the work of Jesus Christ on the cross has removed that forever among those that believe in Christ. Gentiles’ Hostility Toward Jews Now, from the Gentile side, there is the arrogance, and the military superiority, and the vicious persecution, and even genocidal mania that has stained the pages of history. We know that very well from the 20th century from the rise of Nazism, and its virulent anti-semitism, and 6 million Jews slaughtered in what they called the final solution of Auschwitz, and other death camps, but that wasn't the first expression of anti-Semitism in history. It's not the first time we see that hostility or hatred from the Gentiles toward the Jews. Throughout history, if you saw a fiddler on the roof, for example, there's a pogrom right in the middle of that in Czarist Russia. That gives you a sense of the history there. The Jews have been persecuted throughout the nations of Europe. They were persecuted during the time of the Inquisition. Going further back, the Crusades were focused not just on driving the Muslims out of Jerusalem, but also they were anti-Semitic in nature. And it goes all the way back even within the scriptures to what happened in the Book of Esther, as Haman was seeking some kind of a genocidal work on the Jews, wiping them out entirely. So, Gentile history of hatred for the Jews is well-established, along with their military superiority. Hostility of Jews Toward Gentiles But the Bible also makes plain the other side. The hostility of the Jews toward the Gentiles. The Jewish jealousy and hatred of the Gentile world as well. The arrogance, religiously. The fact that the Gentiles were, as the text says, "excluded from citizenship in Israel." They were cast out in effect by the Law of Moses, as we're going to talk about today. They were outsiders, and that had the tendency to make the Jews feel religiously superior to those that were inferior to them. They were the chosen people. Then, in the course of time, when the Jews rebelled against God's covenant, as God said they would through Moses, but when they rebelled in the Promised Land, against God's covenant, failed to keep it, God began to give the Jews over again and again to Gentile conquest. Again, and again, God would raise up Gentiles to come in from the surrounding nations and punish the Jews. You see this in the Book of Judges, you see God raising up the various nations that surrounded them. The Midianites, the Ammonites, Syrians, the Philistines, the Egyptians. And again and again, God would give the Jews into the hands of the Gentiles. The very thing that God said He would do as a curse in the Mosaic covenant, in the Old Covenant. He said this in Deuteronomy 28:25, "The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You'll come at them from one direction, but flee from them in seven. You will become a thing of horror to all the kingdoms of the Earth." And then again in Deuteronomy 32:21, God says this, "They, the Jews, made me jealous by what is no God and angered me with their worthless idols, so I will make them jealous by those who are not a people," speaking of the Gentiles. "I will make them angry by a nation that has no understanding." So, you Jews made me jealous by your idolatry, then I'm going to make you jealous by giving you over militarily to the Gentiles. This is the very thing you said you would do in the song of Moses before they even enter the Promised Land. Ultimately, this was completed, consummated in some ways, by the exiles under the Assyrians, and under the Babylonians, as the Jews were driven out from the Promised Land militarily. Then one succession of Gentile overlords after another rose up to dominate them even when a small remnant under Ezra and Nehemiah, came back to rebuild the Jewish presence in the Promised Land, they were still, as was said in those books, slaves in their own land. They were under Gentile domination. And that was very, very difficult. So you see some of that hatred in that history. It's interesting, even this morning I was looking at a couple of verses in Ezra and Nehemiah. It says in Nehemiah 2:20, as Nehemiah's just beginning his work of building the city wall around Jerusalem, some Gentiles come and show up and begin talking to him about that project, and this is what Nehemiah said to these Gentiles. "You have no portion, no right, and no claim in Jerusalem." Well, praise God we do have a portion, right, and claim in the New Jerusalem. Amen. We were outsiders. What was Nehemiah building? A wall. What was that for? To keep them out. And then again in Ezra as they're starting to build the temple, in Ezra 4:3 says, "You have nothing to do with us in building this temple for our God in which we will worship." Again, spoken to the Gentiles. “You're outsiders.” Well, this attitude, this hostility, Jew toward Gentile, which is made much more fierce because they were, in effect, under Gentile domination, and slaves in their own land, came to a fever pitch in the New Testament. When God raised up Saul of Tarsus, converted him, made him the Apostle to the Gentiles, and he began to go from place to place, teaching that in Christ, the very things he's saying here in Ephesians are true, “we gentiles have become sons and daughters of Abraham. And that we're now included in the covenant, the new covenant in Christ.” The nationalistic Jews were extremely angry about that, those that had not yet come to faith in Christ. And they were enraged actually. Started riots in many cities in reference to Paul's ministry to the Gentiles. Well, you see that in Acts 21, when Paul's there and he's with a Gentile, and they assumed that he had brought this Gentile into the temple area, which was absolutely forbidden. And they started to try to kill him, and started a riot and all that. The Romans came in and rescued Paul, and they're bringing him to the barracks where they're going to beat him. Paul had a hard life. I mean really. What a ministry. But here he says, "Just a minute, I'd like to speak to the crowd." I just think that's amazing, Acts 22, it's a witnessing moment. A chance to share the Gospel. I mean, how he thought was amazing. But he stands up and he's sharing his testimony and for the second time in the Book of Acts. We get the story of the road to Damascus, and how he's converted, and they're listing quietly, until he gets to one word. One word. And this is what it says, "Then the Lord said to me," this is Paul talking about his own testimony. They'd been quiet up to this point. "Go. I will send you far away to the Gentiles." The crowd listened carefully to Paul until he said this. Then they raised their voices, and shouted, "Rid the earth of him. He's not fit to live." And then they're shouting and throwing off their cloaks, and flinging dust in the air. One word sent them into anger, “Gentiles.” So there's that Jew Gentile hostility. We've seen it both sides of the equation. Now, it is true that God had chosen the Jews and blessed them. They were in a very special way, the focus point of his redemptive work on Earth. He said at Mount Sinai in Exodus 19:5-6, to the Jewish nation, "Now if you obey me fully and if you keep my covenant, then out of all the nations, you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole Earth is mine, you will be for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." But it was for the purpose of blessing the entire world with the Abrahamic blessing. "Through you,” Abraham, “all peoples on Earth blessed," and I don't think they understood that. They didn't see that. And that theme had long since disappeared from the Jewish mindset, and from the Jewish way of life. In Christ, it is fulfilled. In Christ, it is consummated. “We Gentiles, who were once so far away have now been brought near” and are included in what God had always planned to do through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Well, that's all by way of introduction. The Distance Between Gentiles and God Remember What You Were, Gentiles Let's look now very carefully at these verses that teach so much about our condition as Gentile believers in Christ. Let's begin in verses 11 and 12 where it makes it very plain that Gentiles, who are formally excluded and without hope, have now been brought near. We were formally excluded. We were on the outside, and without hope. Look at Verse 11-12, "Therefore remember that formally, you who are Gentiles, by birth, and called uncircumcised by those who call themselves the circumcision, that done in the body by the hands of men. Remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel, and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world.” So Paul here calls on the Gentiles to remember what they were formally. We've already seen that earlier in the worship service today. The benefit of going back and remembering how it was. Now, Ephesus, these Ephesians, they were from the city of Ephesus. It was in Asia Minor, modern day Turkey. And that was a Gentile region, a Gentile city, and a Gentile region. And they worshiped Pagan deities, like Artemis, the goddess of the hunt, whose image had supposedly fallen out of Heaven. And they built this huge temple to her, that was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. There was paganism, it was a pagan place, they worshiped idols. Their men were uncircumcised, as Paul mentions in this text. They were seen by Jews, by some Jews anyway, to be unclean dogs. "They were," verse 11, "Gentiles by birth” or more literally “Gentiles in the flesh." Their genealogy, their racial lineage, was Gentile, not Jew. Paul wants them to look back and to remember how it was for them as a nation, and group. Why is that? Well, it's just a truth. And we've been seeing this again and again. The more you realize what you were before you were converted, the more joyful and thankful you'll be now and energetic in service to Christ. The more you know just how black, and dark, and distant all of that was, the better it is for you. I just love singing that song, Jesus, Thank You. Don't you? I leaned over to Daphne this morning? I said, "I love this song. It gives me a chance to tell Jesus, ‘Thank you.’ Just to say, ‘Thank you for saving me.’” And we've already seen this already, this morning, and earlier in Ephesians 2, how Paul has already brought their minds back. In verses 1-3, look, "As for you," he says, "You were dead in your transgressions and sins in which you used to live. When you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air. Spirit who is now at work and those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath.” That's what we were. Remember how you were. Look back at how you were. Understand that condition. Formerly Called “Uncircumcision” by the Circumcised Now, he wants to tell these Gentiles even more about their situation. God had begun a work of redemption through the Jews. Think of the world like a dark howling wasteland. Like a blizzard in some mountainous region, and there's some light shining and a fire that started, and there's some food cooking, and there's this place of warmth, and you're in the blizzard. But it's like you can see the light, and then as you draw nearer you find that there's this huge wall erected around it. You are on the outside and there was a wall there preventing you from coming in. You couldn't be included, that's what he's saying. You were on the outside. Now, Paul himself was raised in a Gentile region. He was also raised in Asia Minor. He was in the city of Tarsus, 700 miles to the east of Ephesus, right along pretty much the same latitude, right across. And he knew what it was like to be surrounded by Gentiles. He himself was a Roman citizen and he understood this situation. So, he doesn't know how much these Gentiles knew about Jewish laws and regulations, but he's going to tell them. He's going to say, "Remember that formally, you who were called the uncircumcision." Alright, “Gentiles in the flesh and called uncircumcised, by those who call themselves the circumcision.” You're seen to be outsiders by these Jews, “called uncircumcised by those who call themselves as circumcision.” Now, to some degree, this statement here is a bit of a digression an aside. Paul's interrupting his thought and said, "There are some people who think hard thoughts about you and they call themselves the circumcision. These Jewish nationalists. I understand them, I was one of them myself at one point. And they call themselves the circumcision. They have a sense of spiritual superiority to you, hostility toward you. They have a certain hatred toward you, but their circumcision," Paul alludes to this, "their circumcision is merely external, and physical, it's not spiritual." He's going to talk about this in Romans 2:28 and 29. He says, "A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly. Nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly, and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise does not come from men, but from God." So that's a true Jew. Okay. They've had that inner-work of transformation by the Holy Spirit. It's a circumcision of the heart. They've been transformed. The very thing that happened in Ephesians 2:4-5. Go ahead and look at it. "But God made us alive even when we were dead in transgressions, it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up." That's another way of saying the same thing. That spiritual circumcision, by the Spirit, not by the written code, that hasn't happened to these people, they call themselves a circumcision and they're only focusing on the physical. Six Facts About the Gentile Condition Okay, well anyway, you Gentiles, alright, what should we remember? Well, let's remember six devastating things about you in that condition. “Remember that at that time, when you were not a Christian. Back then, before you were converted, alright, you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel, and foreigners to the covenants of the Promise, without hope, without God in the world.” Six different things that Paul says was true of us as Gentile, unconverted people. Separate from Christ So first he says, "You are separate from Christ, you are outside of Christ, you are apart from Christ, you are not in fellowship with Christ." Christ for us is everything. Christ is life, Christ is our hope. We have nothing apart from Christ. And so, when you are not a Christian you had nothing from Christ, you were separate from Him. Christ is the fullness of joy. He is life and power and peace and everything good in the universe. But more than that, you Gentiles, you didn't even have any promises or any hopes or any thoughts about Christ? You didn't have a heritage of waiting for the Messiah. You didn't even know about Him. You didn't know that one had been promised who would come would be the Savior of the world. You didn't have those kinds of thoughts. So you were separate from Christ. You had nothing like that. Excluded from Citizenship in Israel And secondly he says, "You were excluded from citizenship in Israel." Citizenship, the language of citizenship is something these Gentiles would have understood, dominated as they were by the Romans, and there was such a thing as Roman citizenship. Paul himself was born a citizen of Rome,. And so being a citizen of Rome brought you certain rights and privileges. Certain advantages and benefits. Well, they were outsiders, they had no rights and privileges when it came to Israel. And why? Because the law of Moses kept them out, it excluded them, told them they were not permitted to enter the assembly of the righteous. They were outsiders. In Deuteronomy 23:2-3, it says this, “No one born of a foreign marriage nor any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the Lord even down to the 10th generation.” That's right in the law of Moses. “No Ammonite or Moabite or any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the Lord even down to the 10th generation.” When they came back under Ezra and Nehemiah, they were all about genealogies. You've read those books. Genealogy all the time. “Are you Jewish?” That's the question. And then in Nehemiah 13:1-3, it says on that day, the Book of Moses was read aloud and the hearing of the people and it was found written, “that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever be entered into the Assembly of God.” Now listen to this, the kind of extension of this “when the people heard this law, they excluded from Israel all who were of foreign descent,” everybody. So you might say, “Wait a minute. I'm not Ammonite I'm not a Moabite.” Well, you're included, excluded, included in the excluded. If you're not Jewish, you're out. What's interesting though is honestly the entire Old Covenant was about exclusion, for everybody. Wasn't it? Wasn't the tabernacle, just a bunch of cloth walls that kept people out? Wasn't the Temple, a more permanent bunch of walls that kept people out? Wasn't it true that you couldn't enter the Holy of Holies, unless you were descended from Levi and descended from Aaron and it was the Day of Atonement, and you brought blood, and you better get out of there, quickly? So there are these barriers, all of this. We'll get back to that in a moment. But God had set this up, He had set up this barrier, He had set up this dividing wall, He had set all of this up with its commandments and regulations. It excluded all uncircumcised people, from the sacred assembly. The Gentiles were outsiders. Look at Verses 14-15. Do you see the words there? “Barrier.” “Dividing wall.” See it? Verse 15, “the Law with its commandments and regulations.” That's what kept us out. The circumcision rule, the dietary regulations, all of the Jewish laws. Kept us out. Foreigners to the Covenants of the Promise Thirdly, foreigners to the covenants of the Promise, what is this? Well, God made a promise to Abraham, when He called him out of Ur of the Chaldees. “Leave your country and your people, and go to the land I will show you.” "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you, I will curse, and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you." So that's a promise. Then He made him even more promises, He says at one very incredible time. It was night time, and He takes him out, God takes Abraham out of the tent and has him look up at the stars and he says, "Look up at the stars and count them if you can", then He makes him a promise, “So shall your offspring be.” “You're going to have descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky,” that's a promise made from God to him. The very next verse is key to our salvation. “Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.” So you first have to hear a promise, then you can believe it. But the Gentiles had no promise made to them, none that we could believe. And then, it mentions the “covenants of the Promise,” “the covenants of the Promise,” and so in Genesis 15, that very same chapter He makes him the second word. “I'm going to give this land that you're walking on here to you and to your descendants forever.” So how do I know that I'm going to get it? It's not looking too good right now God. So then God had him make a covenant. He had him have animals, and he sacrificed them, and laid them out and made a path between them, as that was a covenant cutting ceremony, and suddenly, mysteriously, this fire pot, representing the presence of God, moved between the pieces and in effect, God said “May I personally cease to exist, if I don't keep this promise to you, I will keep my promise to you, I will keep this covenant, you will get the land forever.” Well, that was Jewish though. The Gentiles had no such covenant cutting ceremony, they had no covenant made with them. Nope, no such promises have been made to the Gentiles, their outsiders. God wasn't making them any promise at all. And notice, it's plural “covenants.” The second covenant I think that Paul has in mind is the covenant made with David, that God would raise up one of David's sons and seat Him on His throne, the throne of David, and he would reign forever and ever a king reigning over a chosen people, in an eternal land that would be theirs forever and ever. That's what God was doing through the covenants, but the Gentiles were outsiders. They were excluded from the covenants of the Promise. Without Hope Fourthly, they, “were without hope.” I would say just like Ephesians 2:10 I would say, there's very few days that go by I don't think about Ephesians 2:10, “that I am God's workmanship created to do good works today, which I want to do which God has prepared for me.” How about this one. That the non-Christians that surround us, the lost people are “without hope and without God in the world.” Think about that every day, think about what it would be like to go through life without hope and without God. It's inconceivable how much misery, human misery, is packed into these words. “Without hope.” What do people do when they're hopeless? Well, some of them kill themselves. Other people drown their sorrows in drugs and alcohol. Or in workaholism or achievements or material possessions, or entertainment, or sports. Because they don't have anything, and as they go on there's more and more sense of despair that just doesn't satisfy doesn't satisfy it's “Vanity of vanities, it's meaningless.” Now, I think there are three types of hope. I've talked to people, non-Christians and Christians alike about this, and it just has to do with a time frame. Hope always has to do with the future. “Who hopes for what he already has?” We don't hope about past things. Hope always has to do with the future. What is hope? Hope is a feeling in the heart, a positive feeling that the future is bright. “I'm looking forward to the future, the future will have good things for me.” Okay? Time frame. First, let's start with eternity, that I'm looking forward to eternity. I'm not afraid to die, I believe in eternal life, and I think eternally, I'll be happy, eternal hope. No one on earth but Christians has any reason for eternal hope, none. Then there's long range hope. “I like how my life is going.” Might have to do with your career, might have to do with a long-term goal. Maybe you just got married, and you're looking forward to a beautiful life with your wife, with your husband. looking forward to that. Things are looking good for you down the road and from now until death, it's going to be good, long range hope. And then there's that short-term, immediate hope. “We're going out to eat tonight at my favorite restaurant. Looking forward to that! Future is looking bright. Short, short range future.” What ends up happening is more and more non-Christians get down to that final one. More and more, and they just live for today. “Let us eat and drink and be merry, because I don't even know if tomorrow's ever going to come and if it does, it's probably going to be bad.” So that's what it means to be without hope. We have a God who has gone ahead of us, in time, and has basically said, “Not only have I been to your future and seen it. I've ordained it, I've decreed it, and nothing will stop it. Your future is bright. So be filled with hope. Be filled with joy.” We have that as Christians. Non-Christians, don't have that. “Without hope, and without God” means without God as a blessing. God sees everything they do. He is a constant watcher of men and women, He knows everything that we do, that's not it, that's like Hell. That's God. There to punish. God, there to curse. God, there to pour out wrath, not God to bless. That's what, “without God” means here, that God isn't making any commitment to bless you. He's made no promises to bless you. “Without hope and without God in the world.” The world is just Satan's world where Satan is in charge and dominant. Can I just stop and just do an application here? Do you not see how we have to be evangelistic in this world? Do you not see how we have got to reach out to non-Christians? We've got to see non-Christians that we live with differently, that these folks have no hope and we have hope in our hearts! Our centers are radiant with hope! By the way, you need to live that out, right? Just live out hope, just speak your hope all the time. Because somebody's going to come and ask you to “give a reason for the hope that you have,” so you have to be putting that hope on display. Amen? So just put that hope on display and hopeless people will say, “What is going on with you?” They're out in the howling wilderness and it's dark and cold and you're like, sitting around a very warm campfire, eating well, and you're protected, and they're like, “I want in. How do I get in?” “Repent and believe in Jesus.” Well, they're “without hope and without God in the world” But now, He says, in verse 13, “In Christ Jesus, you who were once far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. But now,” isn't that almost exactly like, “But God?” Isn't that fantastic just like, “But God”? In verse 4, we have “But now.” Gentiles Now Brought Near by Christ You who were once far away you have been brought near, and how amazing is that we're near, near to what? Not so much near to the Jews. Although we'll get to that. You've been brought near to God. This infinite, high and holy God, the one who, as Daniel quoted earlier, “I live in a high and holy place.” “I live in a high and holy place,” but also with him who is contrite and “lowly in spirit,” “I live with people that are broken-hearted and that come to me through faith in Christ.” You've been brought near. This is the God who sits, “enthroned above the circle of the Earth, and its people are like grasshoppers.” We were as sinners distant from God, and now we have been “brought near” and it says, “through the blood of Christ,” or “by the blood of Christ.” There is no salvation for us sinners, apart from the “shed blood of Christ,” we will never be done talking about the blood of Christ, it says in Leviticus 17, “the life of the creature, of the animal, is in the blood, and I've given it to you to make atonement for your sins.” Well, that was in the old covenant, but we learned in the new covenant that “the blood of bulls and goats could never take away sin.” It was just a symbol, And “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness,” but blood has been shed for us, amen? Isn't that beautiful? “The blood of Christ has brought us near.” Jesus died on the cross, He shed His blood in our place that we, who were once distant might be now brought near to God. Brought Near by Christ’s Bloodshed Now, here's the key to the “barrier, the dividing wall of hostility coming down.” We're going to talk much more about this next week. This is the key to the end of racism. This is the key to the end of the hostility between Jews and Gentiles. This is it. Christ has made us one. Look at verses 14 and 15, “For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in His flesh the law with its commandments and regulations His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace.” Well, Christ is our peace. This section here, verses 14 and 15, begins and ends with peace, and so, Christ by His bloodshed on the cross has taken away the wrath of God. So, the peace horizontally takes a back seat to the first, and that is peace vertically with God. God was at war with us, we were His enemies, but now, in Christ, God has reconciled us to Him, through faith in Christ. And so we now have as we saw earlier, Romans 5:1-2, “we have peace with God” through our Lord Jesus Christ. So vertically, we now have peace with God. And so what that means is horizontally we are drawn close to oneness with one another. We, having been reconciled to God, we can be reconciled to each other. Look at verses 15 and 16, “His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two,” one out of two, “thus making peace and in this one body, to reconcile both of them to God through the cross by which He put to death their hostility.” So, the war is ended. The war is ended with us and God, and then with us and brothers and sisters in Christ, we are one with each other, we are reconciled to one another, we have been made at peace with each other. So he says that the two, Christ has now made one. Now, the key to that is our spiritual unity with Jesus, if you come to faith in Christ, you are made one with Jesus, look back at verses 4 through 6, “But God who is rich in mercy made us alive with Christ, with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved.” Verse 6, “And God raised us up with Christ, and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms, in Christ Jesus.” We are one with Christ, And that's true of every single Christian on the face of the earth. We are one with Christ, all of us. It is impossible for two individuals to be each of them, one with Christ and not one with each other. We are in a status of oneness with Christ. Now, we need to act like it in terms of our walk with Christ, in holiness. We are also in a status of oneness with each other, and we need to act like it and walk like it. And so on that basis, Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians are made one with each other, as well, one body united in Christ. Now, later he's going to say this in Ephesians 4:3-6, he says, “Make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace.There is one body and one spirit just as you were called to one hope, when you're called - one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is overall, and through all, and in all.” Unity Made Possible Only Through Christ Now, there are some difficult passages to interpret in the Bible, but what's the main important word there? I think it's “one.” I mean It's kind of like you have to be dense, not to see it. One. There's “one Lord, one faith, one baptism.” “One” hope we are one, we have all been made one in Christ. Now the way he does that is by transforming us individually, making us new men and women, new boys and girls. Look at verse 15, "His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace.” 2 Corinthians 5:17, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is gone, behold everything has become new.” We're changed, we're transformed and we're going to talk next week about racism and all of those issues. So much of it just has to do with the change of the heart, and covering of the history, and forgiveness, and all of those things God has done that for us, he has transformed our hearts and made us into new people. So, no longer Jew, no longer Gentile. Now with a new name Christian, A believer in Christ. Amen? One new man, one new work he's doing, it's the only designation that matters and the Spirit takes that hatred, that bitterness, that's based on history, based on actual sins that have occurred and takes it away. Christ’s Miraculous Power to Change Hearts I love the scene in the movie, Ben-Hur, one of my favorite movies, and there Judah Ben-Hur, a Jewish man had had a Roman friend when he was a boy, Messala, but when each of them grew up Judah Ben-Hur grew up as it as a Jew, and very nationalistic and caring about his people, Messala grew up as a Roman and grew up very nationalistic, and caring about his people, they came back together after having an apart since they were teenagers, they could not be friends and Messala was bitter and negative toward the Jews, but wanted to use Judah Ben-Hur to betray his people And use him as an informant and all that, and Judah wouldn't do that. So, Messala turns and punishes Judah Ben-Hur, sends him on a slave galley, takes Judah's mother and sister beloved, mother and sister and throws them in prison with no charges where they contract leprosy. Somehow God spares Judah Ben-Hur, brings him back but he is so seething with hatred at Messala, he can't stand him, he's filled with bitterness and rage over the history and what has happened, And then when he finds out that his mother and his sister have leprosy, and it's Messala's fault, it just goes off the charts. Messala ends up dying in a chariot race, but the hatred doesn't go away. It's like a heat seeking missile, he's just looking for something, and he hates Rome, he hates the world, he hates everything, but he meets Jesus as He's on his way to dying on the cross. He actually watches Him die in the movie. And he had met Jesus earlier, Jesus had given him some water when He was on His way to the slave galley. Now, he sees Him dying, and he hears Him say those words "Father forgive them, they don't know what they're doing", and the blood flows down, and in the movie it was very powerful. And then he comes back, he's just a different man. And he said, "When I heard Him say those words, I felt Him reach down and take the sword out of my hand. That's What happens when Jesus makes you a new man or a new woman. He Just reaches down and takes the sword right out of your hand and you are one with somebody that you, in every other way would be an enemy with. That's the power here. And so Christ has done that, and it says in the text, he's done it by destroying “the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.” Well, this was the last issue in the text. There were laws, there was a circumcision regulation, there were dietary regulations. Jesus, we are told here, has abolished it. Look at verse 15, he talks about the “barrier of the dividing wall of hostility,” verse 15, "By abolishing in His flesh the law with its commandments and regulations.” He abolished them. Hebrews 8:13 says that in Jesus, “in His blood, there's a new covenant and by calling this covenant new, He has made the old one obsolete.” So the old covenant is abolished. That's the text. It's obsolete. That's Hebrews 8:13. We now no longer are at any spiritual disadvantage uncircumcised we don't have to keep the ceremonial regulations, the dietary regulations. That “barrier, that dividing wall” has been removed. That horizontal barrier has been removed because the vertical one has been removed. When Jesus died on the cross, the curtain in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, and now “we have access to the Father by one Spirit,” so Jews and Gentiles who have come to faith in Christ, are perfectly one in Him. They just need to act like it, they need to live out that oneness. Now, we're going to talk next week about how hard that is and more of those aspects. I would say that this text is the most powerful one that I know at getting at the root of racism and bitterness and division. We'll talk more about that next week. A few other applications, then we'll be done. Application First, as Gentile Christians. Let's just stand amazed at what He has done. Just do what Paul says. “Remember how it was for you,” formally remember what you were remember the journey that God has taken you from remember how you used to be an outsider, and now you're in. Now, you're inside. Now, you're loved. Keep that in mind and rejoice. If you like, Jesus, Thank You, go home and sing it. Find another song then sing that one. Just praise Him and thank Him. Secondly, Verse 18 says that “we now both Jews and Gentiles in Christ have free access to God through the Holy Spirit.” Take advantage of it. Come close to God. He has brought you near positionally, now come close in prayer, Bring your problems to Him, “Let us draw near to God, having a sincere heart and pure assurance of faith, as it says in Hebrews 10. Thirdly, and I've already mentioned this and I'll say it again. Meditate much on the condition of people who are not yet converted. Think about the fact that they're “without hope and without God in the world,” have mercy on them. Last week I challenged the home fellowships to have each member identify five people that they know to be lost, that you're praying for by name. Okay, so I'm ready. Home Fellowship, I've got my names alright, I was busy this week meeting people, but let’s just let's reach out, let's get names of lost people and let's pray for them. And if perhaps you have a chance like Ben and some others of sharing the Gospel and reaching out, let's be bold, let's share. And then finally, let's meditate on our supernatural unity, in Christ. We're going to talk much more about it next week, but this is the only answer there is for the kind of racial tensions and divisions there are in our country and in the world. Let's meditate on it, let's Get Ready. So I'd urge you just read this text over in light of some of the difficulties that we've been having, even in our nation and around the world and see the answer there. Close with me in prayer. Prayer Father, we thank you for the truth of the Gospel. We thank you O Lord that apart from Christ we had no salvation but now we, who are once far away have been, “brought near through the blood of Christ.” Lord I pray that there wouldn't be a single person here that would leave this place unconverted, today. I pray that they would trust in Christ for the forgiveness of their sins and find in Jesus, the salvation that they need. And Lord, I pray for all of us who have already found forgiveness and unity and hope in Christ, that we would be filled with thanksgiving and that we would be filled with boldness to take the Gospel to those who are “without hope and without God in the world.” In Jesus' name, amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches on Galatians 4:1-11, and how God frees people from the slavery of sin. - SERMON TRANSCRIPT - One of the most powerful Christian novels of all time, historical novels, and probably one of my favorite movies of all time is Ben-Hur. It was written by a former Civil War general, named Lew Wallace, who was a strong believer in Christ. It's an amazing story of a Jewish nobleman, a wealthy Jewish man, who was wrongly condemned for attacking the Governor of Judea by a boyhood friend, a Roman friend named Messala, who had become a passionate convert to the Roman Empire and was zealous for the glory of the Roman Empire. And it led him falsely to accuse his boyhood friend. And for three years, Judah Ben-Hur was enslaved. He was in chains, as a galley slave, rowing on a Roman warship. And you have this picture in your mind's eye of what that bondage was like, what that slavery was like. A chain around his ankle and the lash of the taskmaster on his back or on the backs of the other slaves, if they needed to row faster and they weren't doing what the master wanted done. And in the story, Judah Ben-Hur comes to save the life of his Roman commander, Quintus Arrias, a Roman tribune named Quintus Arrias, very powerful man. And in the course of events, this Roman man is so filled with love for Judah Ben-Hur, that he comes to adopt him legally as his son, as his heir. In the novel, General Wallace writes these words. These are the words of Quintus Arrias. He's speaking to his friends about this Jewish man. He said, "Good friends, this man is now my son and my heir. Who as he is to take my property, if it be the will of the Gods that I shall leave any, shall be known to you by my name. I pray you all to love him as you love me." Now, this story may have struck many at that time as preposterous. How could a high-ranking Roman official ever adopt a Jewish slave to be his heir and his son? But General Wallace was a genuine Christian and he understood the Gospel. And he knew that something far more amazing than that, far more preposterous happens every time an individual sinner is brought to faith in Christ. Something far more amazing than that, and what is that? That the holy God of the universe, who can't even look at sin because his eyes are so holy. This holy God adopts sinners who were rebels, fighting against him, adopts them to be his sons and daughters, and makes us heirs with his only begotten Son. Heirs of the universe that he is going to make for us. That's even more amazing than anything General Wallace wrote in the novel Ben-Hur. Perhaps the most astonishing aspect of our salvation is our adoption. It's really amazing. It was JI Packer that summed up the Christian message in these very brief words, "Adoption through propitiation." By the blood sacrifice of Jesus, the wrath of God is turned away. We are reconciled through that propitiation work and we are adopted into the family of God. And it is astonishing. We get to study that today. I mean, there's no better way we can spend our time, Amen? I think this message has the power to make you Christians far happier than you were when you walked in here. Amen? And even better, it has the power to make any of you who are presently outside the Gospel, who are living in darkness, who are living in bondage, to set you free, as well. And you can walk out of this room, every bit as adopted, and every bit as much an heir as a Christian has been so for 50 years, when they walked in here today. I. From Enslaved Childhood to Free Maturity (verses 1-3) So let's get to it, shall we? Enough of the introduction. Probably should have just jumped right in, but I like these kind of stories. I think they set up the issue very, very well. We're looking here in verses 1-3, in Galatians 4:1-3, of a movement from enslaved childhood to free maturity. Look at the verses. He says, "What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his Father. So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world." So, we've got a train of thought here. We're jumping in the midst of a flow of thought. Sometimes, the chapter divisions break things up a little bit more than they should be broken up. But we're in the middle of a train of thought here. Verse 1, "What I'm saying is... " Paul says, or to kind of unfold this thought a little bit more. So, we want to go back to Galatians 3:23-29, which I think in many ways was the climax of a lot of Paul's reasoning or train of thought. Again, to step back and look at what's going on. The Apostle Paul was a trailblazing, church-planning missionary. He was the Apostle to the Gentiles. He came to this region in Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey, and he preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And many Gentiles, many pagans came to faith in Christ and became Christians as a result, then he left. And after he left, some other false teachers came along. Jewish people, who claimed to believe in Jesus, but also said that these Gentiles had to be circumcised and required to obey the Law of Moses, in order to fully and finally to be saved. They were called by many, not in the text, but they were called Judaizers, they were false teachers. And so, Paul is reasoning against that, and he says that the Gentiles, these Galatians, the moment they heard the Gospel and believed it, they were justified by faith in Christ, all of their sins were forgiven. And they received the gift of the Holy Spirit, they were adopted as sons and daughters of God, they became sons of God. And they received the spirit who cries out, "Abba, Father." We see that in Galatians 3:26, he says, "You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus." Simple and clear declaration. And then, in verse 29, "If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs, according to the promise." Now, Paul talks about it in both passages, the last one and this one, a time of confinement before the time of freedom. So we're moving from confinement or somewhat bondage, to a time of freedom. Both of these scriptures, these sections talk about it. Both passages speak of a guardianship that has now ended, both passages speak of a transition, so that we're no longer under that confinement. Both passages speak of our status as sons of God, no longer slaves. Both passages call us heirs, standing ready to receive a vast inheritance. So in effect, he's repeating these same themes, he's going at it again. Why does he repeat it? Well, he wants to emphasize it, he wants to help these Gentile believers in Christ to realize their freedom and their status as children of God, and that they would not submit to a yoke of bondage. And he wants to do it because it's evident that they've relapsed into their old way of thinking, when they should be living a whole new kind of life as adopted children of God. Instead, they're thinking like slaves again, and they seem to be bound in servitude to a pattern of relating to God and he wants to set them free. He yearns for them to understand their status as adopted children of God and to live out that freedom in holy lives that honor God. And so, he begins with this image of a movement from childhood to maturity. Every culture has rites of passage, in which sons become men. The time of childhood has ended, now it's time of adulthood. And so, this movement from childhood to adulthood is what was well understood in those days. And also, the movement of liberation, from being in bondage to being set free, and you become a freedman, you're no longer a slave, that was understood as well. So first, this movement from childhood to adulthood. Look at verses 1-2, "What I'm saying is that, as long as the heir is a child, he's no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. And he is subject to guardians and trustees, until the time set by his father." Now, again, we have to look at this in terms of the big picture of Israel as God's people, the Jewish nation. And he's trying to answer the question, "What then is the purpose of the Law? Why did the Law of Moses come? If it's not meant for our salvation, if it's not meant to be the ladder by which we climb up to heaven by our good works, if that's not what it was for, then what was it for?" And he's going to answer it, both in terms of the nation as a whole, and in terms of individual sinners. So why did God give the Law, only to repeal it later? Now, these are very important questions. It was God who said, "You must circumcise your sons on the eighth day." You can read chapter and verse, it's very clear and there's indications there because Moses hadn't circumcised his sons, that God was ready to kill him. It's a whole other passage. But God was serious, this was something he commanded, if you disobeyed, you were cut off from your people. This was a serious thing. Why did God put it in, only to take it off later? The same thing with the dietary regulations. Why would he make it very clear what they could and couldn't eat, if later all foods were going to be declared clean, why? Why would God have all these ceremonies and special days and months and seasons and years and a whole calendar of religious observances if he's only going to take it off later? Why even do it at all? And so, Paul reverts to this image of childhood and then a movement to maturity, to adulthood. The Jewish nation was in some metaphorical sense the son of God, a child of God. God told Moses to say to Pharaoh these words, Exodus 4, "This is what the Lord says, Israel is my firstborn son. And I told you, let my son go, that he may worship me." So that's a clear statement. He sees that metaphorical connection between himself and the nation as a whole, "Israel is my firstborn son." Then, in Deuteronomy 1, Moses talking to the Jews, says about their experience for 40 years out in the desert and how God had cared for them. He said, "You saw how the Lord your God carried you as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place." And then in Hosea 11:1 it says, "When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt, I called My son." So, for an extended period of time, the Jewish nation was held under guardianship to the Law, that's what Paul's saying. The nation was subject to guardians and trustees, to these precepts and laws, and rules. And they had to obey these laws and regulations, and strictures and precepts, like circumcision, the dietary regulations, and the ceremonial rhythm of the calendar and all that. And yet, the whole time, the Jewish nation was seen by God in the big picture to be Abraham's seed and heirs, according to the promise, and that someday, they will come into their full maturity. Now, in many ways, Paul says, the child in a wealthy home, picture this child in a wealthy home, little different than a slave in that home. Some of you children are saying, "Amen. That's exactly how it is." I've been saying that and you're just not listening. We're just like slaves around here. But that's a different topic, different message. That's not what I'm talking about here. But in many ways, that's how it is. The child has to obey the laws, and the rules, and the regulations of the household, or there's going to be consequences, there's going to be punishments to come. The child is not free to walk away, child's not free to do as he or she pleases, child's a little different than a slave, though someday, Paul says, "They're going to come into the whole estate." And so, also the descendants of Abraham, the Jewish nation, would someday inherit not only that patch of promised land, but as we've seen in Romans 4:13, "It was through a promise that Abraham received the news that he would be heir of the world." And how awesome is that? So, the status of the Jewish nation under the law was temporary, like that of a child who has to come to his maturity. They were schooled by the constant demands of the Law. Charles Spurgeon put it this way, "The Jewish nation of old was under the yolk of the Law. Its sacrifices were continual. Its ceremonies were endless. New moons and feasts must be kept. Jubilees must be observed. Pilgrimages must be made. In fact, the yoke was too heavy, heavy for feeble flesh to bear. The law followed the Israelite into every corner and dealt with him upon every point of his life. It had to do with his garments, it had to do with his meat, his drink, his bed, his board, everything about him. It treated him like a boy at school who has a rule for everything. Now that faith has come, we are full-grown sons, and therefore, we are free from the meticulous rules which govern the school of the child." I bet you're wishing he would just come preach a sermon and not me, right? Isn't that powerful? But Spurgeon really just makes it clear, when the heir gets to the set age, he then comes into the full status in the household, and that's a picture of salvation in Christ. The status of the Jewish nation under the law was temporary, like that of a child who has to come to his maturity. They were schooled by the constant demands of the Law." Look at verses 4-5, "When the time had fully come, God sent His son, born of a woman, born under Law, to redeem those under Law that we might receive the full rights of sons." So those under the law, at that time, were Jews, and not Gentiles. But they were locked up under the guardianship of the Law, until Jesus had made his entry into the world. Now, the same image is applied to individual Christians, as well. There's a sense of confinement, a sense of bondage under the Law, under the lash of the Law, your conscience accusing you, all of that, until you come to the freedom of faith in Christ. Same thing for the individual. II. From Slavery to Adoption (verses 3-8) So let's go to the next section of the sermon, verses 3-8 "From slavery to adoption." The fact of our slavery is established in verse 3, "So also, when we were children, we were in slavery, [he says] under the basic principles of the world." Then, he gives us the good news of our redemption by Christ. Verse 4-5 say, "When the time had fully come, God sent His son, born of a woman, born under the Law, [verse five] to redeem those under the Law." Just like Daniel was saying about the ransom, a price paid, we're set free, not slaves anymore. Redemption through His blood, to redeem those under the Law that we might receive the full rights of sons, and then, the declaration of our status as sons. Look at verse 7, "So you are no longer a slave, but a son. And since you are a son, God has also made you an heir." Isn't that beautiful? Look at verse 7. Verse 7 has the power to give you joy in any and every circumstance of your life. You are now a child of God. So look at the facts of our slavery. Paul puts all Christians in one analogy, in verse 3, "So, too, when we were children, we were in slavery," he says, "under the basic principles of the world." The essence of slavery is bondage. No freedom, no way out. Sense of domination, especially if the master is cruel, but to what were we bound? Paul says, in verse 3, "We are in slavery under the [NIV gives us] basic principles of the world." Basic principles of the world. ESV has, "elementary principles of the world." The Holman translation has, "elemental forces of the world." Clearly, this is an interesting idea. It's an interesting word. He's going to mention it again in verses 8-9. Look down at verses 8-9, "But in the past, when you didn't know God, you were enslaved to things that by nature are not God's. But now, since you know God, or rather have become known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and bankrupt elemental forces?" Same word, see that? Do you want to be enslaved by them all over again? Now, the word is a very interesting word. I don't usually pronounce Greek words here. I'm not trying, in any way, to impress you with my Greek knowledge. Just a few minutes with me and you won't be impressed. But 'stoicheia' is the word. Now, my parents are both chemists, and I learned that there's something in chemistry called 'stoichiometry.' You don't need to know this, there's not going to be any quiz, it's not on the final. But what it is, is it's a process by which chemists can figure out what elements are in a chemical, in a compound. Stoichiometry. They're able to break it apart into its elemental parts. What does Paul mean, though, by this word? Well, in Paul's day, it could either refer to the fundamental components of the universe, what we would call atoms, so the basic building blocks from which everything is made. They had elements like air, earth, fire, water, but we have the elements in the periodic table, basic elements. Or the word could refer to essential principles of some area of study, like the ABCs in a primer, like the kind of elemental lessons, the things you learn when you're just a little kid, beginning something that you're studying, like basic piano skills or something like that. Or it could refer to invisible spiritual beings, what we would call demons. All three of those are really actually very interesting, and the scholars go on and on about what they think it is. But Paul says, in any case, we were enslaved to those elemental things, whatever they were. We're enslaved by them. It could mean that then, before faith in Christ, the Galatians were all enslaved to the basic forces of the universe, the basic laws of morality they could never keep, and the demonic forces that rule the world of the unregenerate. So if the basic principles of morality are in mind, they were a cruel master, in that they could only bring death. Jews, under the Law, or moral Gentiles under their conscience, and under their sense of right and wrong. Either way, it was a form of bondage. If the elemental forces of the world were demons, they were malicious and vicious, and wanted to enslave and to beat people up because they're murderers and they hate human beings. "Galatians were all enslaved to the basic forces of the universe, the basic laws of morality they could never keep, and the demonic forces that rule the world of the unregenerate." Now, the slavery analogy is very powerful. Apart from Christ, every single person, every sinner, is a slave. Jesus said in John 8:34, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin." In bondage to sin. And you heard Daniel read Ephesians 2:1-3, powerful words, "As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live, when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath." Jesus likened Satan to, in Luke 11, a strongman fully armed who guards his possessions carefully. Well, his possessions are people. People in bondage, people in a house of slavery, and he's standing like a strongman at the door and he won't let anyone get in. Jesus says, "If I want to rescue them, I have to overcome him. I have to overwhelm him and strip him of his armor and subdue him and then, I can rescue you." And that's exactly what he said, I am doing by driving out demons. Powerful image there. Jesus, it says, in Matthew 9:36, "When He saw the crowds, He had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Harassed by demonic assaults, helpless to get out." It says in Romans 5:6 that we were powerless, at the right time when we were powerless, Christ delivered us. We were powerless to set ourselves free, that's the essence of our slavery. And even worse, we were in bondage to death. We were en route to death, judgement, hell. It says in Romans 5:21 that “sin reigned in death.” Paul there personifies sin and makes sin sit like a vicious tyrant on a throne, the throne of death, and we couldn't get out, could not set ourselves free. We were all slaves before faith came, before Christ came, our condition was desperate. No matter how we understand this word, 'stoicheia,' this elemental forces, we come up losers. We couldn't even keep the most basic moral principles you learn from your mommy when you're little, be good, do good, think good, things like that. ABCs, be generous, treat others well, don't hurt people. I mean, just the basic lisping principles of morality, we couldn't keep them. And we were afflicted by the basic human drives of human existence. We were enslaved to our stomachs. We couldn't get out, the drive for food, the drive for love, the drive for significance, all of these things, and pleasure, we're enslaved to them. And though we couldn't see this, and an atheist would never acknowledge it, etcetera, but we were enslaved to demonic forces. We had demons that were inflicting us and harassing us and crafting special temptations for us, and flogging us. Couldn't see it, but it was true. We were enslaved to sin and Satan and death and there was not a thing we could do about it. III. Christ Redeemed Us From Slavery (verses 4-5) But Christ redeemed us from slavery. Amen? How sweet is that? Look at verses 4-5, "When the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, to redeem those under the Law, that we might receive the full rights of sons." In the fullness of time, God had a perfect timetable. Isn't that beautiful, how God has worked everything out so carefully before the foundation of the world and orchestrated a timetable? I believe he did that for all of human history and he did it for your life, as well. You came to Christ at the perfect time, in the fullness of time. And so also, Jesus entered the world in the fullness of time, at the perfect time. Now, why was that the perfect time? Well, John Calvin says don't speculate, it's none of your business. That's kind of the way he is. He just hates speculation. It doesn't say why it was the fullness of time, the perfect time, it just was. John MacArthur said it was perfect for four different reasons. Either way, I think it's interesting to look into, so with apologies to Calvin, we're going to go ahead and look at why was it the fullness of time? Well, it was the perfect time religiously because the Jewish diaspora had already happened. The Jews were scattered all over the Roman Empire. And they'd spread the idea of monotheism, and they had set up the laws of Moses that were read in the synagogues on the Sabbath every week and that was already infiltrating and there many Gentile converts to Judaism and they were aware, so it was the perfect time religiously. But the Jews had come back from dominion under Gentile power and they were still under the Roman boot and so, it was just perfect for a delivery to come, it was just the right time culturally because Alexander the Great had swept through, with his zeal for Hellenism, his zeal for Greece and everyone pretty much in that region spoke Greek. And so, as a result of that, there was a unified language. The Romans spoke Greek and the Jews spoke Greek and it was the common language and so that really facilitated the preaching of the Gospel. It was the right time politically because the Pax Romana had subdued that whole area, made travel easier, there were the Roman roads and it was just a great time for travel and for moving out. I don't know, all I know is that's when Jesus was born and God thought that was the perfect time! God is the Alpha and the Omega, he is the first and the last. He is the beginning and the end and everything's been sequenced, down to the atom, every moment. He knows exactly the right time for everything, perfect time. God sent forth his Son. The exact same verb he's going to use to talk about the Spirit, isn't that awesome? God the Father sent forth Jesus, and God the Father sent forth the Spirit to achieve the ends of the sermon, that you would be liberated from bondage and adopted as his sons. This is God the Father doing this and he sent forth his Son into the world, as an ambassador. The idea here is of a missionary or emissary or an ambassador. Jesus was a heavenly missionary sent from heaven to Earth, a heavenly ambassador from the heavenly country, down to this rebellious land, and he came. God sent his only begotten Son into the world to save the world from sin, says in John 3:17, "God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that the world would be saved through Him." And it says he was born of a woman, marvelous phrase. At Christmas time, we celebrate this, but we can celebrate this year-round, amen? I had the thought that I might line up my sermons with Christmas, but we're what, we're five, six, seven weeks off, sorry. I just love the details, there was no chance we're going to preach this at Christmas time, but here we are, we can still think about it, can't we? We celebrate the incarnation of Jesus, the mystery of the God man, fully God, fully human, born of a woman. "God the Father sent forth Jesus, and God the Father sent forth the Spirit ... that you would be liberated from bondage and adopted as His sons." The deity of Christ, very plain, the humanity of Christ, also very plain. John 1:1, "In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God." And verse 14, "The word became flesh and made his dwelling among us and we have seen His glory, glory of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth." The incarnation, focus here, is specifically on Jesus born of a woman, and I think that must hearken back to the first prophecy about Jesus, back in the Garden of Eden, you remember? How the serpent came with his subtlety and guile and approached the woman, Eve, and deceived her and led her into sin, and she gave some fruit to her husband, who is with her, and he ate and then God comes in judgment to deal with the situation? And as he deals with the serpent, as he deals with the snake, who we know is Satan, he's taken on this deceptive guise, as he always does, God judged the serpent directly. To some degree, the serpent had made kind of a deal with the woman, kind of a pact. And God came and severed it in a beautiful way. He says, "I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will crush your head and you will bruise his heel." It's a clear prophecy for us of Christ, isn't it? Jesus is the seed of the woman and it's very unique because of the special movement of the Holy Spirit on her body, so that there was no human father and this is the mystery of the incarnation. Mary wrestled with it first, really. When the angel told her what was going to happen, the angel said in Luke 1:30-35, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God, you will be with child and give birth to a son and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the most high." There's the deity of Christ. "The Lord God will give Him the throne of His father, David," that's the humanity of Christ, "and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, His kingdom will never end. 'How will this be?' Mary asked the Angel, 'since I am a virgin?' The angel answered, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow you, so the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.'" So Jesus was born of a woman specifically because he had no human father. There was no human father in this amazing conception of Jesus, but Mary was fully human and so Jesus has connection to the genealogy of David, his father, as he was called Son of David, was through her, he was born of a woman. It also says he was born under the Law and how beautiful is this? Jesus came from absolute freedom on the throne of the universe and put his neck under the yoke of the Mosaic Law. It's just amazing to think of the humility, the condescension of Jesus to do that. He was under the yoke, it was said a yoke that neither we nor our fathers are able to bear. Jesus, this mighty Samson, really comes and he can bear it. This moral Samson, this powerful ruler, who comes and puts his neck under the meticulous precepts of the Law of Moses and fully obeys it, perfectly obeys it. He was completely obedient to the Law of Moses. Now, in many ways, Jesus is the only one that really perfectly fulfills the words that Paul gave us at the beginning of this text. Look again, verse one and two, this is really of Jesus, I think. "What I am saying is that as long as the heir," read Jesus as the heir, "as long as the heir is a child, He's no different than a slave, although He owns the whole estate. He is subject to guardians and trustees, until the time set by His father." Isn't that true of Jesus? Jesus is the heir of the world, He's the heir of the universe, Son of God, but he submitted to his parents, right? Submitted to Joseph and Mary, didn't he submit to them? Says he was submissive to them, in Luke 2. He obeyed all of the laws, submitted to that. He was under guardianship until the right time, perfectly law-abiding. Jesus alone, fulfilled his own summary of the Law. Remember that, the twofold summary? "Jesus came from absolute freedom on the throne of the universe and put his neck under the yoke of the Mosaic Law. It's just amazing to think of the humility, the condescension of Jesus to do that." The first and greatest Commandment of the Law is this, "You should love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength." Only one man has ever done that. Jesus obeyed that. He loved God every moment of his life, with every fiber of his being. And the second is like it, "Love your neighbor as yourself." The cross, really, is the measurement of Jesus's love for his neighbor. He was willing to die for us. Perfectly, day by day, healing infirmities, feeding the hungry, counseling those that needed wisdom. Jesus loved His neighbor perfectly, He was submissive to that. He actually obeyed all of it, every minute detail. Those are just the summaries. He obeyed it all, all the 10 Commandments, perfectly obeyed. Some scholars have counted 613 commandments given in the Mosaic covenant, he obeyed them all. All of them. Jesus said, in Matthew 5:17-18, "Do not think that I've come to abolish the Law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until Heaven and Earth pass away, not the smallest jot or tiniest tittle, the little pen stroke of the Law will pass away, until everything has been fulfilled." Jesus was under every jot and tittle, every little minute, meticulous law. And Jesus's perfect obedience to the Law won a righteousness in the sight of God, that He then offers you as a gift. Isn't that awesome? His active obedience to the Law for those 30 plus years that he lived under the Law, wove a garment, everyday that he lived under the Law of Moses, another thread in the loom of a beautiful, radiant garment and he just hands it to you in the Gospel and says, "Here, put this on. You're going to need this on Judgment Day. So put it on and I will see you. God, the Father, will see you as perfectly righteous in me." We are not saved, except by the active obedience of Christ, under the Law, day by day, plus the passive obedience of Christ to take the curse of the Law on himself. Both of those are essential to our salvation. Tim Keller beautifully put it this way, "Jesus lived the life we should have lived, and died the death we should have died." It's beautiful, isn't it? To redeem, it says, those under the law. The word 'redeem' here fits this context perfectly. We were bought out by the payment of a price. Says in 1 Corinthian 6:19-20, "You are not your own, you were bought at a price." It is so vital for us to remember that. We don't own ourselves. Jesus shed his blood, says in Ephesians 1:7, "In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace." So by Christ death, the Law no longer has any claim on us, in that sense. The Law does not stand over us any longer to condemn us to hell. We are free from the accusations and the condemnation of the Law through Jesus. Roman 6:14 also says, We are not under sin at all. "Sin shall not be your master because you are not under Law, but under grace." It's a whole different way to live now, we are free. We're not under what once bound us, we are redeemed from tyrannical masters. We are set free. But free to what? Free to what? Free from the Law and all that, now what? We're on our own? Think about how it was with the slaves here in America. After the war was over, millions of them instantly set free. For what though? Some of them had nowhere to go. Some of them actually stayed in the same plantation and worked in much the same way because they had no other... Now, they had to be paid. But they just didn't... Into what kind of life were they being freed? Now, definitely, it was superior to slavery, but there's a question. IV. The Full Rights of Adoption (verses 5-7) The text says we are not merely set free, we are also adopted by our Father, who will now take care of us and provide for us and protect us the rest of our lives. We have been adopted, not just set free, not just emancipated. And so we have verses 5-7, the full rights of adoption, "To redeem those under the Law that we might receive the full rights of sons, and because you are sons, God sent the spirit of His Son into our hearts, the spirit who cries out, 'Abba, Father!' So you are no longer a slave, but a son. And since you are a son, God has made you also an heir." This is the most astonishing aspect of our privileges in Christ, we are adopted, adopted sons and daughters. Now, our status as sons and daughters is not by nature, but by grace. You could say, in one sense, there's only one natural Son of God, what we call only begotten Son of God, and that's Jesus. Forever, there'll be an essential and infinite difference between Jesus and us, in that sense. He is the only one of his kind, only begotten. The Son, Jesus, is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, that's what Jesus is. We are adopted by grace, what was our nature? Well, you know what our nature was. How about this? Titus 3:3, "At one time, we too are foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envied being hated and hating one another." That was our nature. Contrary to our nature, by grace alone, we are adopted now, as sons and daughters of the living God. This is a supernatural work, something only God could do. We are born of the spirit. It says in John 1:12-13, "as many as received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God. Children born not of blood, nor of the will of man, nor of human nature, the will of the flesh, but born of God." It's a supernatural... Every Christian is a miracle, supernatural movement of God's grace on you. And when he did that, then God sent forth, like he sent forth Jesus, he sent forth his spirit into your hearts, crying out, 'Abba, Father!' Crying out, 'Abba, Father!' It's almost like a homing mechanism, a beacon going inside you, saying, "Father, Father, Father, Father," or you could also say, "Heaven, Heaven, Heaven. I'm coming home, I'm coming home." And the spirit is leading us along that beam, right to that celestial city. How awesome is that? The spirit in our hearts crying out, 'Abba, Father!' By the way, Abba, the very same thing Jesus called his father in Gethsemane, daddy, in Arameic, "Abba, Father," he said, "All things are possible for You. May this cup be taken from me." But that intimacy, the spirit of Jesus, the spirit of sonship is in us. Crying out, not just whispering, crying out, "Abba, Father!" And it's so awesome, the Father now in Christ loves us as much as he loves his own son. It's incredible teaching, but Jesus prayed that. He said, in John 17:23, "I, in them and you, in me. May they be brought to complete unity, to let the world know that You have loved them even as You have loved me." That's awesome. And that spirit testifies, it says in Romans 8, "With our spirits, that we are God's children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and co-heirs of Christ, if indeed we share in His sufferings, in order that we may also share in His glory." And we are infinitely rich in that. Infinitely rich, as adopted sons of God, and we are going to be made rich. It says in Revelation 21:7, God has made this clear promise, "He who overcomes, will inherit all this." New Heaven, new Earth, new Jerusalem, and "I will be his God, and He will be my son." V. The Insanity of Sons Living Like Slaves (verses 8-11) Alright, so that's what we are. Do you not see how insane it is to live like a slave? Do you not see how insane it would be for us, who are redeemed sons and daughters of the living God, to live like slaves? Look at verses 8-11. "Formally," it says, "when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not God's, but now that you know God or rather are known by God, how is it that you're turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? You're observing special days and months and seasons and years. I fear for you, that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you." He's talking there about their former life as pagans. Ignorant of God, they did not know him. They didn't know his holy ways. Living in lust and pagan revelry. Sacrificing to pagan deities. Living under the dominion of demons. It says in 1 Corinthians 10:20, "The sacrifices of pagans are given to demons." They were enslaved by those who, by nature, were not God's: Demons, wicked, hostile, restless, murderers. That was your former way of life, oh Galatians. That's the way you used to live. "Now that you know God, and even more importantly are known by God," how sweet is that? We love. Why? Because He first loved us and you know what? We know him. Why? Because He first knew us. It's vastly more important that God knows us than that you know God, just so you know. It's so important that on Judgement Day, he claims you as one of his own children. And so he claims, everything has changed for you now. You know God and are known by God. This God, who it says in the Psalms, "Oh Lord, You have searched me and You know me. You know when I sit and when I rise. You perceive my thoughts from afar. You know when I come in and when I go out. You hem me in behind and before." This God knows you intimately and loves you completely. How can you now go back to your old way of life? How can you turn back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you want to be enslaved by them all over again? You're observing special days and months and seasons and years. Now, I want you to listen carefully what I am about to say. It's probably one of the most explosive things in this whole sermon. Here it is. The implication of that statement is this, that by going after legalistic Christianity, in which the Law of Moses dominates, it's no different than it was before the Gospel ever came to their town. Let me go a step further. Christless Judaism is every bit as demonic as paganism or animism or anything else. They're equally demonic. We tend to think, "Well, you know, it's monotheistic, at least. It's a step closer to it." No, it's just the deception of the devil to ensnare people with moralistic, legalistic principles and teach them that they can save themselves by their own good works. It's just demonic. So Christless Judaism is every bit as demonic as animist or paganism or pantheism or any of those things. There is a beautiful circle of light and that's called the Gospel. We stepped inside of it because everything else is darkness. And Paul says, "you're going back to the same thing you had before I came to your town and preached. I am afraid, I fear that somehow, I may have wasted my efforts on you." "Christless Judaism is every bit as demonic as paganism or animism or anything else." VI. Applications So what application can we take from this? Well, first, understand the spiritual condition of every non-Christian around you, enslaved to these demonic principles and they can't get out. They can't set themselves free, there's nothing that they can do. There's only one power that can set them free and that's the power of the Gospel. It is the power of God to salvation for all who believed. Secondly, understand the gift of redemption through faith in Christ. Blood redemption is full payment for our sins. Understand the joy of that, freedom from guilt and condemnation. Trust in Christ, all of you, trust in him. You may have been Christians for decades, trust in him still. Look to Christ and trust in him. Don't lapse back into legalistic patterns, trust in him at every moment. Those of you who walked in this place outside of the Gospel, come in now. Come in while there's time, come into the circle of light, come into freedom, come into adoption. Then you get to celebrate your emancipation for the rest of your life. So I can just say this to you Christians, celebrate. Smile, not just because the sermon's almost done, because it is. But celebrate, celebrate that you are set free from sin and bondage and demonic forces, celebrate that. Be joyful and delight in the privileges of your adoption as sons and daughters. You have a Father now who loves you, you have security in his family. He will never kick you out. He will provide for all of your needs until the day you die. He will protect you from all attacks, nothing can harm you, accept what passes through his hands and it won't harm you. All trials come from him. You have discipline. If you sin, he's going to discipline you, he's going to treat you like a son. If you sin, he will discipline you. You have free access to the Father in prayer. The spirit cries out within you, "Abba, Father!", so pray. Pray freely, pray with great confidence, pray with great zeal and energy. You have fellowship with brothers and sisters, you're in a vast family. You have now a shared family mission with the Father. He's doing some work, He wants you to join Him in the family business, we can put it that way. You have the Holy Spirit as counselor and guide. You have authority to reign with Christ. You can be called, are called by God's name. You are known by God and you can know him. So don't live like a slave. Finally, very practically, a good number of the members of our church are excited about in the process of literally adopting children. It's a very costly process, it takes a lot of money, it takes a lot of energy. It takes a lot of resources. Our church should get around the people who are doing that. We should encourage them. We should find out who they are, we know who they are, I'm not going to list them right now, but we should encourage them. We should say, "How can we help?" They'll let you know, alright? But let's be financially generous to help them. Let's pray for them and encourage them, and let's just rejoice in adoption itself. It's such a great picture of the Gospel, isn't it? Close with me in prayer. Father, we thank you for the time that we've had to study Your word and I pray that as we close now this worship service, oh Lord, I pray that You would fill us with Your spirit, the spirit of sonship, by which we cry "Abba, Father!" and that we would walk in the joyful freedom that is ours, as adopted children of God and as co-heirs with Christ. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Épico clássico, o filme de William Wyler venceu 11 Oscars e é considerado uma das maiores obras de artes do cinema. Charlton Heston faz o protagonista Judah Ben-Hur, um príncipe da Judéia que é traído por seu amigo e é enviado às galés onde se torna um escravo. Qual a origem da obra? O que essa versão de 1959 tem de tão especial? Por que os livros de cinema citam Ben-Hur como um dos maiores filmes já feitos? Essa é mais uma edição da série Forever. Jurandir Filho (Juras), Thiago Siqueira (Siqueira) e Fábio Barreto (SOS Hollywood) conversaram sobre essa obra prima. Qual a importância do cinema religioso? Ben-Hur realmente existiu? Qual a sua relação com Jesus Cristo? Por que a corrida das bigas é considerada uma das cenas mais famosas e bem executadas da indústria? Quais os números do filme? Quem são os responsáveis por trazer Ben-hur para as telonas? Tudo isso e muito mais.

Épico clássico, o filme de William Wyler venceu 11 Oscars e é considerado uma das maiores obras de artes do cinema. Charlton Heston faz o protagonista Judah Ben-Hur, um príncipe da Judéia que é traído por seu amigo e é enviado às galés onde se torna um escravo. Qual a origem da obra? O que essa versão de 1959 tem de tão especial? Por que os livros de cinema citam Ben-Hur como um dos maiores filmes já feitos? Essa é mais uma edição da série Forever. Jurandir Filho (Juras), Thiago Siqueira (Siqueira) e Fábio Barreto (SOS Hollywood) conversaram sobre essa obra prima. Qual a importância do cinema religioso? Ben-Hur realmente existiu? Qual a sua relação com Jesus Cristo? Por que a corrida das bigas é considerada uma das cenas mais famosas e bem executadas da indústria? Quais os números do filme? Quem são os responsáveis por trazer Ben-hur para as telonas? Tudo isso e muito mais.

Theatrical presentation of Judah Ben-Hur by the Sanborns

Introduction Well, you don't have to know me very long before you find out that Ben-Hur is my favorite movie. And it is my favorite movie, it's a great story. And in that story, it's a historical novel that was written by General Wallace in the 19th century, a picture of redemption, “A Tale of the Christ” is the subtitle in his novel. But in the movie, which most of us have access to and we, many of us, have seen, Judah Ben-Hur is a Jewish nobleman, wealthy, a Jewish man, he's got a beloved mother and sister, lives in Jerusalem. And as the movie begins, a boyhood friend who was a Roman, a man at this point, named Messala comes back. He has been made lieutenant governor of Judea, and he returns and the two of them try to rekindle their friendship, but it isn't long before they realize that they have grown apart, they have different ways of looking at life, they have different ways of looking at the world. And when Messala tries to use Judah Ben-Hur as an informant against the zealots among his people, the bitterness starts to set in.They quarrel, they divide, and their friendship comes to an end. But the bitterness just grows and grows throughout the movie. As the new governor enters the city, he rides right below Judah Ben-Hur's house and a stone falls from the roof, it causes the governor's horse to rear. Governor's thrown from his horse, injured seriously, but doesn't die. Soon the Roman soldiers are pounding on Judah Ben-Hur's house, they open the door, and they come in and they arrest Judah and his mother and his sister. Very tense moment. And at that moment, Messala appears. And Judah is immediately relieved and he thinks that this clear mistake and injustice will be dealt with right then, and he makes a direct appeal to his boyhood friend, Messala, to let he and his mother and sister go, because it was just an accident. But this man stands there with a heart of stone and eyes of coal, and says nothing and the three of them are hauled off at that moment. All three are condemned. Mother and sister to languish in the prisons there in Fort Antonia, and Judah Ben-Hur is condemned to row in the slave galleys, leaving from Tyrus. As he's making his way in chains down to the port city of Tyrus, he's about to expire from thirst, and a man just shows up, you never see his face, and as he's lying there on the ground about to die, this man pours water on his face and then lifts his head up and pours water down his throat and revives him, basically gives him life. Well, for three years Judah lives a life, a brutal life of a slave on a galley and with every stroke of the oar he vows vengeance against Messala. And his burning hatred for Messala keeps him alive. Through one circumstance or another he gets freed from being a slave, he ends up becoming the adopted son of a Roman nobleman and makes his way back to Jerusalem, and he has one task, there's only one thing he wants: he wants revenge, he wants vengeance for Messala. He would also like to find his mother and his sister and as he goes and confronts Messala, it turns out that Messala has no idea where they are. And as he sends to find out about them, we come to learn that they have become lepers, and he sends them to be in a leper colony there. One of the climaxes of the movie, Judah Ben-Hur and Messala ride in a chariot race, climactic chariot race and Messala is thrown from his chariot and trampled by his own horses, and it's a mortal wound. And as he lies there dying, Judah Ben-Hur goes to see him and he, just to twist the knife in a little bit deeper, let's Judah know that his mother and his sister are now lepers living in the valley of the lepers. And at that point Judah's hatred intensifies greatly, but Messala dies and now he's just filled with hatred and a yearning for vengeance. And the only avenue he can find for it is to basically take down Rome, if he can. It's a suicidal hatred and vengeance. However, as he's carrying his leper sister into Jerusalem, he sees the same man who years ago had poured water down his throat and saved his life, but now he's carrying a cross up to Calvary, it's Jesus, and their lives intersect at that particular moment and he leaves his mother and sister with a friend and goes and stands there and watches Jesus die. And as he's dying his blood flows down the cross and is carried by the rain water down the streets, and somehow reaches the mother and the sister and they are miraculously cleansed of their leprosy. Judah doesn't know it, but they're cleansed. But something more miraculous happens, something more astonishing. And as he watches Jesus die, he hears Jesus speak these incredible words. “Father forgive them, they don't know what they're doing.” He stands there transfixed and soon transformed. He returns to his now healed family and tells them that he too has been healed of his hatred, his unforgiveness, his suicidal thirst for revenge, and the movie ends with Judah's awestruck words, “As I stood there, I felt his voice take the sword from my hands.” It's my prayer today that this sermon, this parable will take the sword of unforgiveness from your hands. I'm convinced that every one of us wields it from time to time, sometimes for years. And I think it's every bit as suicidal as was Judah's against Rome. I think it's a bitter poison that ruins life, ruins marriages, it ruins relationships, it ruins churches. It's bitterness, and Jesus and his love would have us free from it, so he uses a very heavy-handed parable to do it. Because that's what it takes to free us up from that suicidal thirst for vengeance. Unforgiveness is Human, Forgiveness is Divine A World that Delights in Revenge We live in a world that doesn't know anything about forgiveness. It's a world, the lost, the non-Christian world isn't comfortable with the topic of forgiveness. If you ever try to go apologize or seek forgiveness, I mean, genuine forgiveness from a non-Christian, they will cut the conversation off very quickly. They don't know what to do with it, they don't wanna deal with it, and so they just quickly say, “Oh, don't worry about it, it's nothing.” They minimize. They do not deal with it. We live in a world that delights in unforgiveness and in vengeance. Many, many movies these days are focused on the issue of vengeance and the joy in getting revenge on somebody who's hurt you. The Sweet Power of Forgiveness… Even to Enemies But Jesus from the cross teaches us a better way as we've already heard. He didn't just teach in Matthew 5, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” he did it from the cross. “Father, forgive them, they don't know what they're doing.” By the way, I am convinced that those for whom Jesus prayed are in heaven now. Jesus doesn't throw away words and if they're forgiven, they're forgiven. So, how sweet would it be to see the Roman centurions, and all that party that was around Jesus crucifying him up there in heaven and actually see a little bit of fruit toward the end after Jesus dies when the centurion says, “Truly this man was the Son of God.” There's the fruit of Jesus' prayer, what an effective prayer ministry Jesus has, amen? What a sweet thing it is, but he has shown us the way. Peter’s Question of Accounting: “How Many Times…?” Context: Life in the Church Now, Peter begins this whole conversation with a question of accounting. “How many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” So he's bringing this question of forgiveness. Now, let's set it in context in Matthew 18. You remember as the chapter opens, the leaders of the church, the apostles are there, and they're having an argument with one another about which of them is the greatest. And Jesus calls a little child and has the little child stand in their midst and says, “I tell you the truth, unless you are converted and become like a little child, you'll not even enter the kingdom of heaven, the essence of the kingdom of heaven is brokenness, humility, meekness, lowliness.” He goes on from there to talk about the danger of sin, because they are going to be the under shepherds, they're gonna be the ones that are caring for the church, and he wants them to know, the real issue isn't which of them is the greatest, but that their ministry is gonna be a ministry of shepherding little ones just like this child concerning sin. So he talks about the danger of sin, he gives a warning to the world because of the things that cause people to sin with that picture of the millstone being hung around the neck. He talks to them personally about the danger of sin. “If your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one hand or one foot, than to have two hands and two feet and be thrown in the fire of hell.” The great danger of sin. Talks about the ministry, they're going to have as undershepherds and going to look for the one that wanders off. And we do wander off, don't we? And so these undershepherds shouldn't be bickering and arguing about which of them is the greatest, they should go look for the wandering sheep. That's their ministry. Then Jesus gives us this whole issue of dealing with sin in the church, which we took three weeks to look at, and if your brother sins against you, then go and reprove him or rebuke him, show him his sin, just between the two of you. And so we ran through that whole issue concerning church discipline, even to the point of verse 17, “if he refuses to listen and even to the church, then treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.” Verses 18-20 speak clearly about the church's rights and responsibilities in dealing with sin. “Whatever you bind on earth to be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth to be loosed in heaven,” and talks about the need we have to pray for one another. “So if you agree about anything you ask for it will be given to you, for where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.” So, he's just dealing with the issue of sin all the way through this chapter. Issue Here: Forgiving other Christians And so, therefore, Peter's question is quite reasonable. Now, how many times shall I forgive my brother? Let's say we go through the whole church discipline pattern and the brother repents and comes back, but then he falls back into sin again. Now, how many times are you gonna go through that? Up to seven times? So that's how he asks. Now, I believe that the context here isn't so much that of forgiving enemies and unbelievers outside of the church. He says, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me?” But I think that there are principles that go and extend even beyond the walls of the church, but let's focus on the issue of forgiveness within the church, forgiving other Christians. I think that's the focal point here, an in-house, a family matter about forgiving other Christians. Although, I do think we can extend it even to enemies as we've already seen. A Question of Accounting: How Many Times??? And so, we have this issue of accounting. How many times shall I forgive him? And he gives a recommendation. “Up to seven times?” he says. Now in this, I think almost certainly Peter felt he was going above and beyond the call of duty. In his day Jewish Rabbis limited forgiveness to three times. I think they use references from the Book of Amos in this; Rabbis took statements that God makes about sinning nations in Amos 1:3, eight times we have this kind of thing, but Amos 1:3 says, “For three sins of Damascus and even for four, I will not turn back my words.” So the rabbis zeroed in on this, and one rabbi said, “He who begs forgiveness from his neighbor must not do so more than three times.” So that's three strikes and you’re out long before baseball was invented. So also another rabbi said this, “If a man commits an offense once, forgive him, if he commits an offense the second time, they forgive him, if he commits an offense a third time, they forgive him. The fourth time, they do not forgive him.” So, that's pretty solid teaching from the rabbis, three times. Now, what's going on with Peter? Well, I think that Peter has been watching Jesus' sweet, merciful, loving ministry for all of these years, and he knows that three times just can't be enough. He's seen Jesus be gracious to tax collectors and prostitutes, he's seen Jesus be gracious to his own enemies who are trying to kill him. We've seen him be gracious to Pharisees and Sadducees and lepers, and it's just a river of grace and mercy and so, he says, “Well, we've gotta up the ante. Maybe double it and add one,” okay? How about seven times, up to seven times, is that good enough? But Peter is still thinking like a man does. He's thinking in the ordinary human way, of forgiveness measured in the ordinary way, and by ordinary human accounting techniques. Imagine keeping a tally sheet saying, alright, you're up to four times now. More than half way here, you only have three left. Use them well. That kind of thing. This is just human arithmetic, and we know from 1 Corinthians 13, it says, “Love keeps no record of wrongs.” And so, Christ wants to expand Peter's heart and mind and takes him to the infinitude of God's forgiveness of us as sinners. Based on that, commands us to forgive freely from the heart. He gives an overwhelming and a stunning answer in this parable of the 10,000 talents. Christ’s Stunning Answer, and Overwhelming Parable Christ’s Stunning Answer: There is No Limit!! And basically, the answer I get is, there is no limit, there's no limit. Jesus says in verse 22, “I do not say to you seven times, but 70 times seven.” 70 times seven. The Greek, definitely, I think tends not merely to 77 times as the NIV gives us, but 70 times seven as we have in the King James, New American, RSV, and ESV. So you're up to 490 times, if you're still wanting to keep a record, okay? But that's for everybody. So you can imagine carrying around the record books, okay? You gotta keep a record, and if you have a large family, you need a lot of books. And if you're in a church, you need even more books, you need a wagon full of books for 490 times. You're up to 280, we've got 210 left. It's ridiculous. Clearly, he's pointing to open-ended, unlimited forgiveness. That's what he's doing. The Parable of the Ten Thousand Talents And he gives us the Parable of the 10,000 talents, it's a shocking parable. And I think, as I looked at it, there are four real shockers in it, four real stunning aspects of this parable. First of all, the size, the magnitude of the servant's debt, it's really stunning, 10,000 talents, we'll talk more about in a moment. Secondly, the unconditional forgiveness by the judge that he just at a word forgives it all. Just out of mercy, forgives it all, that's stunning to me. Thirdly, the unforgiveness of the servant after that is stunning, really is the central stunner. Jesus is meaning for us to be shocked by it. It's really stunning. And then the final fate of the servant. He gets handed back over to the jailer to be tortured until he should pay back the original debt. Stunning and with theological implications and difficulties. We have four shocking aspects of this parable. So, let's go at it verse-by-verse. He starts the parable in a common way, he says, “The Kingdom of Heaven is like...” At the center of this kingdom is a king, and so therefore, as in all of his parables he wants you to come face-to-face with the king. Understand who the king is. And so, there was a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. So we have the first act of this three-act drama. Okay, the first act is the trial before the king or the accounting, let's say, we'll call it an accounting before the king. All servants are accountable to the king. In the ancient world, the king's authority was absolute. And he was your king and your life was in his hands. Every subject of the kingdom was under his dominion and everyone was accountable to him. And so, look at verse 24. “As he began the settlement, a man who owed him 10,000 talents was brought to him.” It is essential for you as a Christian to see yourself in this light. I am a servant of the king and some day I will stand before him and give him an account. So, this servant who's called in is probably, I think, a high ranking official, perhaps even a nobleman, very high in the kingdom. How else would he come into such a huge debt? And so, he's an important official in the kingdom, but he's still accountable to the master. He must give an account for everything that he's done. Now this man's debt is astounding, 10,000 talents. Let's try to understand that. It's really an overwhelming debt beyond pretty much, I think, beyond calculation, let's calculate anyway. Bear with my engineering heart for just a moment. A talent was anywhere from 52 to 83 pounds, generally taken to be 75 pounds. So you have 750,000 pounds of some precious metal, generally gold. So let's go with gold, since the tendency of this parable is toward the extreme anyway, so it's 750,000 pounds of gold. Simply doing the math that I didn't check the market this week, I don't know, but let's go with market prices from a week or two ago. You've got $12,400 per pound times 750,000 pounds. So that's $9.3 billion, that's a lot of money. Imagine owing $9.3 billion. But let's go beyond that. Information from the ancient tax record of the time shows that Roman provinces of Jumia, Judea, Samaria, and Galilee, the income from those four provinces was around 900 talents annually. This man owed 11 years of taxes from four regions of the Roman world. Or again, if that's not good enough for you, how about this? The amount of gold that Solomon used to build his temple was just over 8,000 talents, this guy owed 25% more than the amount of gold Solomon used to build his temple. Solomon in his heyday was taking in 666 talents of gold every year, that means Solomon would have to save up all his gold for 15 years to pay it off. This man wasn't Solomon, this man is in deep trouble. And even beyond that, the Greek word for 10,000 is related to the word for “myriad.” So, if you can just say, forget the calculation, he owed an incalculable debt. One might even say infinite. Now this man is in deep trouble. It's hard to imagine how any individual could amass such a debt as that. He is unable to pay, one of the great understatements in the entire New Testament. Unable to pay and the king orders that he and his wife, and his children and all that he has be sold to pay the debt. Now, it's not gonna pay it off. I don't care if he and his wife and all his children work the rest of their lives, it will not add up to that kind of sum. It really is just a punishment. Immediately the servant falls on his face before the king and pleads with him. “Be patient with me,” he says, “and I will pay back everything.” Now this is amazing, it's astonishing, there's no way he can repay this. Solomon himself couldn't have repaid if he saved everything he had for 15 years, and so the king is moved by compassion and pity for this man in this situation. He makes a shocking pronouncement. In verse 27, “The servant's master took pity on him, cancelled the debt, and let him go.” Just like that, just like that, all that money is gone. Now we know the parable of the prodigal son, it's the father that's prodigal, it's the king that's prodigal. All of that forgiven, just like that, forgiven. Oh, how lavish, and how generous is God. I know we're in the middle of a parable, but I can't stay there that we could owe that much to God and he can just forgive it like that. By simple faith in Jesus, our sins can all be forgiven, it's so astonishing. Oh, how much God deserves our praise and thanks and worship and adoration that our debt has been forgiven just like that by the mercy of God. We'll talk more on that later. So the servant walks out of the king's throne room a free man, he doesn't owe anybody anything. So now we come to act two of this drama, “He finds another servant who owes him 100 denarii. He grabs him and begins to choke him, ‘Pay back what you owe me.’ The fellow servant falls on his knees and begs him, ‘Be patient with me and I'll pay you back.’ But he refused, instead he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt.” Now, this is a repugnant scene almost beyond imagination. You're supposed to feel a sense of revulsion, like, let's say David did with Nathan, when Nathan came and told the story about a man who took somebody else's sheep and killed it. You're supposed to feel disgusted, but then Jesus says, you are the man, you are the woman. This is who you are when you won't forgive. It's a disgusting story really. He finds his servant and he begins to choke him, just one of his fellow servants. The Greek gives a strong sense of equality before the king, they're on a par, they're just servants of the king, and he begins to choke him. Now, this man owes him 100 denarii, it is a mistake to minimize that sum, it's a mistake. Because you'll then forget or think improperly about this parable and not understand what's going on. A denarius was a day's wage for a laborer. So you work all day long, you get one denarius. This man owed about a third of a year's wage for a laborer. So in our day and age it might be somewhere between $10,000 and $20,000. So let's say $15,000, it's wrong to look on it as pocket change, a buck 98 or something like that. It's not that, it's maybe $15,000. And imagine, somebody owed you $15,000 and he's not gonna pay you back. It would be upsetting to you. If you minimize the 100 denarii, then you'll also think the parable doesn't have anything to do with this situation in your life or that situation or the other. These are very serious things. That was a minor thing. No, it's a significant sum, but it is nothing compared to the sum that the king forgave the servant. That's the point. As significant as you think it is, it's still nothing compared to what the King has forgiven in your case. That's the whole point. So, he begins to choke him and, as though he's gonna kill him, something like a collection thug for a mafia racket, he's gonna break both his legs. And what happens next is really quite striking. The servant falls on his knees before him and says, “Be patient with me and I'll pay you back.” Does that sound familiar? It should, it should have sounded familiar to the servant who's choking him. That's exactly what he had done before the king. But the difference is, this man refuses, instead he has the man thrown into prison till he should pay back everything he owes. So now we come to act three of this drama, act three. The other servants are shocked at what they saw, and they go to the king and they tell the king everything that happened. The king is enraged, and he calls that servant back in. “‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to, shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’” Now, the English word “should” gives a sense of moral imperative. You owe this, you ought to do this, you're in some kind of an obligation. You're in some kind of debt to the king. There's a sense of moral obligation here. Hence the title of my sermon. Title of the sermon is the doctrine of the sermon and that is this: “Forgiven Sinners Owe Forgiveness to Other Sinners.” That's the doctrine. Forgiven sinners owe forgiveness to other sinners. And God will hold you accountable for that. Now, the servant says nothing in act three. There's nothing to say. He is there under the power of the king to hear the king's sentence over him, and there's nothing he can do about it. Verse 34, “In anger, his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured until he should pay back all he owed.” Now, there is an open question as to whether the servant is now back under the original debt again, the 10,000 talents and it brings us into the theological question of is this a picture of our own salvation with God, down to theological details, like justification by faith, apart from works of the law? And how do we deal with that? Do we go in and out of indebtedness with God, justified one day, not justified the next, back justified again, based on how well we forgive? It cannot be friends. Justification is a timeless, a once for all declaration by Almighty God that you have been forgiven of all debts, past, present and future. Well, how do you line that up with this parable? I think what's going on here is that Jesus is telling this parable to say, if you don't forgive, you haven't been forgiven. You're not forgiven. You're still under the debt and you always were. And so, if you live a life of unforgiveness, you're not saved, you're not justified, you're not regenerated. No, Christians pay attention to this parable. We take the warning, and we live a life of forgiveness, and we hunt down on forgiveness in our hearts, we hunt it down and we kill it as the murderer of our own souls that it is. That's I think what Jesus is saying here. Christ’s Final Warning So he gives a final warning, verse 35, “This is how my Heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart.” Now, some may feel that this parable is quite heavy-handed on Jesus' part. Somewhat like he's taking our arm and twisting it behind our back saying, 10,000 talents, you must forgive everyone else, but the phrase from the heart removes that vision or that image. We should be glad to forgive, we should be delighted to forgive. We should be delighted to be free from bitterness friends, we don't have to walk around hunting people down who owe us things. We can forgive readily, we can forgive quickly, we can live a clear free life. I liken it to, in the Book of Genesis, Jacob talks about the anger of his sons who murdered a whole village because they defiled the sister. And at the end of life, when he's blessing each of the tribes, he talks about the anger and how it has clouded the hearts, their lives are clouded with hatred and anger. I don't want a heart that's clouded, do you? I wanna be like clear mountain water, you know, you scoop it up and you look through a clean glass and it's just as clear as crystal, and the glory of God can shine through it. We should be glad to forgive. Not grudging about it, delighted to forgive. You know what the key is? The key is the 10,000 talents and the master's pity on you. That's where it comes from. You want power to forgive, go there and work on yourself until you believe the 10,000 talents. You're probably up to 180 talents right now, okay? Alright, alright, I owed God 180 talents. No, you didn't 10,000. No, not quite. Alright, maybe 800. Well just keep working on it, keep thinking, keep praying and little by little, you'll start to see the greatness and the magnitude of God's forgiveness for you in Jesus Christ. And all that you've been forgiven. Now, I know in this life, you will not come to the full measure. The psalmist says, “I praise the Lord for his salvation every day, though I know not its measure.” You'll find out on Judgment Day, you'll see it. When you see the holy God sitting there on the throne, and you see your life properly and you will see it, then you will be filled with joy and tears of gratitude to Jesus for all he forgave in your case. Right now just take the 10,000 talents on faith, alright? Take the 10,000 talents that you owed God an infinite debt, start there and it will make you a happy forgiver, and you will be glad to forgive anyone else. Lessons and Implications from the 10,000 Talents God is a King, and We are All His Slaves, Accountable to Him So, what are the lessons and implications from this parable? Number one, God is a king; we are all his slaves accountable to him for everything in our lives. Lesson number one. God Has an Accurate Record of All of our Sins Lesson number two, God has an accurate record of all of your sins and mine. Our Sins Are Infinite in His Sight Lesson number three, naturally, our sins are infinite in his sight, an incalculable debt. God is Willing to Cancel our Infinite Debt Number four, God is willing to cancel our infinite debt. How is that, friends? How can it be? Well, let me just pause and tell you about Jesus. Not the parable teller alone here, but the one who actually pays the 10,000 talents, and not for one individual, but for a countless multitude from every tribe and language and people and nation. Millions and million strong. You can't do the math. And he did it in one afternoon in the shedding of his blood. Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. He shed his blood. “Father forgive them, Father forgive them,” that's what the blood cries. And if you're a sinner here today and you owe God that 10,000 talents, you have never accepted Jesus' forgiveness, you are in an infinity of trouble, and you face eternity in hell. That's the measure of the infinite debt, eternity in hell, that's how I know it's an infinite debt. But the good news of the Gospel is that, if you just fall on your knees and before the king in the name of Jesus say, forgive me. Oh, let's your blood be for me. Let your salvation be for me that he'll save you. But when you get up from that, he's gonna say, you owe every other sinner you ever meet the rest of your life, you owe them free full forgiveness. Deal? And he only says it 'cause he loves us, 'cause it's right. Others’ Sins Against Us Make them Our Debtors And so, lesson five, yes, other's sins against us, make them our debtors. They do owe us 100 denarii, it's a good chunk of money. But let's not forget, there's other horizontal things going on, like, you owe somebody else 100 denarii, multiplied by more times than you wanna hear about, right? So yes, they owe you. You also owe a bunch of other people too, and probably them as well. It's just debt all around, because there's just so much sin, alright? We Have a Powerful Tendency Not to Forgive Those Debts Lesson number six, we have a powerful tendency not to forgive those horizontal debts. There's something that just rankles us about it and we don't want to do it. We are in effect playing god with a little g. And how much of a lesser God are we than he. He's so gracious, so merciful and loving and we just will not forgive. We say no. Send them to prison, playing little God, that's what we're doing. If God Cancels Our Debts, We Owe Him to Forgive Others’ Debts Seventh, if God cancels our debts, we owe it to him to cancel other people's debts. If We Don’t Forgive At All, We Have None of Our Sins Forgiven Lesson number eight, if we don't forgive at all, we have none of our sins forgiven in God's sight, and we will go to hell. If We Don’t Forgive Specific Sins, We Will Have a Diminished Relationship with God Number nine, if we don't forgive specific sins or have difficulty forgiving sins, are slow to forgive, sluggish in some way, our relationship with the king is thereby hindered. Forgiveness Must be “From the Heart” And tenth, forgiveness, if it's genuine, must be from the heart. Those are the 10 lessons I got out of it. You might be able to get 10 more. But let me take all those lessons in this parable, and apply them specifically to this church. Practical Applications Have YOUR Sins Been Forgiven? First of all, I just wanna ask, have your sins been forgiven? Have you come to the cross? Have you trusted in Jesus? Don't walk out of here with that 10,000 talent debt, trust in Jesus. Are You a Forgiving Person? Secondly, I wanna ask you this question, are you a forgiving person? Are you characterized by forgiveness, is that who you are? Would your spouse say that about you, would your children say that about you? Would your parents say that about you? Your friends? Are you generally, freely, and graciously a forgiving person? The implications of this parable is that those who have been forgiven much, love much and those who've been forgiven much, forgive much freely. If you don't forgive readily, there's a clear implication you may not be saved yourself or if you are, then you have some specific sin problems. Let's look at two of them. Pride for example. You make too much about yourself, you think too much about yourself. Well, you don't know what it's like, you don't know what happened. Well, tell me what happened. Well, it was a family reunion, and my brother made a joke about me, everybody laughed, I laughed too, but it wasn't funny. And every time I get a Christmas card or something or a phone call from him, I remember. Friend, you're making too much of yourself. You are not the center of the universe. Your reputation is not as important as you think it is, and so, you have a pride problem. Secondly, you probably have a power problem, you know why? Because when you don't forgive, you're in charge. Everybody's gotta walk on eggshells around you, they gotta come kowtowing to you and ask for things from you. And it's kinda a good feeling, you know, you'll kinda be in charge, it's a power play. Friends, it's disgusting. And the sad thing is, all of us have the pride and the power, all of us, that's why we don't forgive. I think the cross of Jesus Christ is a remedy, don't you? Stand before it and be free, be free of pride. The cross is designed to humble you, and me too. Be free of it, be free of power, give it to Jesus, he's the king, not you. Just let him be God, let him forgive. Is There Anyone You Haven’t Forgiven? Third thing I wanna ask is, is there anyone you haven't forgiven? Think right now, just think in your mind, is there somebody you haven't forgiven? Did somebody pop in your mind? That person you're thinking about right now, you haven't forgiven them probably. If a lot of people are popping in your mind, you have a lot of work to do. It's spring cleaning day here at First Baptist Church, you have a lot of work to do. Search the Realms of Life for People to Forgive You have to find out who you haven't forgiven. Let me help you, let me help you think. Let's start at home. Let's start with the husband and wife relationship. Husbands, have your wives sinned against you? If they haven't sinned against you, you're newlyweds, you've been married for one second, okay? And even then, I'm not sure, you know, there are moments. I actually saw a YouTube of a bridegroom as he was taking a vow, taking a cellphone call right there. I couldn't believe it. I think if I'd been the pastor, I would have stopped it and said get another man, okay, you need more counseling. Alright? He took the call, he took the call. They probably had years of counseling ahead of them after that, okay? He took the call. Well, at any rate, husbands and wives, have your wives sinned against you, husbands? Forgive, forgive. Wives, if your husbands sinned against you, you need to forgive them, Jesus is saying so. And it pollutes your marriage, it pollutes your parenting, it pollutes everything, if you're holding on to old memories of things that happened in the past. What about parents and children? Staying at home now, we're still at home. We've got growing children, we've got teens at home. We've got children age 8 to 10, whatever. Even at that early age there can already be issues of bitterness and forgiveness. Parents can be bitter towards their own children. Children can be bitter towards their parents and think that they're not parenting them well. Siblings horizontally, brother to brother, brother to sister, sister to sister, sister to brother. Is there unforgiveness going on? Is there anything you need to forgive? Are there incidents? They borrowed your outfit and didn't ask, and then stained it and now you can't wear it, it was your favorite. Forgive. Whatever it is, forgive. Let's move out to extended family. Let's talk about grown children with aged parents. There is all kinds of room for bitterness and unforgiveness in that kind of a relationship. The aged parents might be bitter toward their children because they neglect them. They don't call enough, they don't show enough care, enough concern, enough consideration. It may all be true, again, 100 denarii is a lot of money. It's a lot of money. And they should be honoring, they should be loving, they should be doing more than they are. It's true, but you still need to forgive. Grown children of parents. Maybe your parents put some habits into you or showed some bad examples that you're fighting even now, maybe you remember some abuse, you remember perhaps some alcohol problems or some other things, and there's just bitterness in your heart towards your elderly parents, maybe that's why you neglect them. You still need to forgive. Extend it out to grown siblings. Brother with brother, brother to sister, sister to sister, sister to brother. Bitterness, unforgiveness, things that were said, things that should have been done. How about the church? That's a home base of this parable. Let's start with the elder/pastor and church member relationship, okay? There are no perfect elders, no perfect pastors. The sins that pastors hear the most about generally are sins of omission, not sins of commission. Things that the church thinks the pastors should have done. They probably should have done them. They're not perfect men. You need to forgive anyway. Give up on the bitterness, it doesn't help you. And elders need to give up on bitterness against church members as well. Things that were done and said and that hurt, and they're painful. Which people showed a lack of understanding and spoke out of ignorance, words of judgmentalism, needs to be forgiven. How about horizontally, church member to church member? Do you know what I'm talking about? Are there any issues, any unforgiven debts, I mean, things that were said, things that were done, hurtful things sometimes years or even a decade old or more? Extend it out to the world. Christian or non-Christian alike. You may have a boss that is, you don't even know what he's like. Forgive him, forgive him. Ken Sande, Peacemaker Ken Sande has written a book called Peacemaker. I think we ordered maybe 10 or 15 of them. They're in the resource center. This is the best book on reconciliation and dealing with problems in relationships, conflict resolution that I've ever seen. Very thorough, very well written. I urge you to get it. He's actually written a number of books along the peacemaker line. This is the main volume, but there's also Young Peacemaker, peacemaker for children and then other different books, and we've got some of them there. I would urge you to get it. But the children's version stuck with me more than any other. He defines forgiveness in four easy to remember terms, and I've never forgotten and I wanna give it to you. “Good thought, hurt you not, gossip never, friends forever.” When those four things happen, you've forgiven somebody. Good thought. I'm not gonna harbor bitterness, and have bad thoughts in my heart toward that person. I'm done with it. I wanna be clear as a mountain stream, I wanna be clear of it. I will not think dark thoughts about that person anymore. Good thought. Hurt you not. I'm not going to go on some kind of rearguard action or a covert operation in the middle of the night with my face black and trying to hurt this person. That's what Christians do. I mean, it's covert operation. A little bit of, and you know how to do it, you know how to play the game or hurt somebody without people knowing, that's what you're doing. Give it up, don't hurt them, bless them, seek to bless, seek to love, to lavish. Good thought, hurt you not, gossip never. You know what we do, we start getting some allies together. Tell the story, tell it again, tell it a third time. By the way, every time you tell it, you look sweeter, and purer and more like, light, sunlight and they look darker and more evil and it's really frankly not hard to rally allies when you do that kinda thing. Friends, it's gossip, and it's sin, and you make a commitment, I am just not going to tell this story to people, I'm not gonna say anything, I'm not gonna gossip. Gossip never. And this fourth one, the sweetest of all: friends forever. Look forward to spending eternity in heaven with that person. Think about it, pray for it, and then make it as much like that here on earth as you possibly can. Good thought, hurt you not, gossip never, friends forever. Three Key Questions on Forgiveness I wanna finish with a couple of questions on forgiveness and will be done. Should I forgive somebody who hasn't asked forgiveness and doesn't think they need it? What should I do about that? Well, in the context here, if your brother sins against you, go and reprove him, work with him. Bring him to repentance. There is a point in that. But suppose they don't think they've done anything, should you still forgive them? The answer is absolutely yes. Forgiveness is something you do in your own heart, to free you from bitterness. Suppose the person is dead, are you then jailed to bitterness the rest of your life, a dead parent or whatever? No, you're not. You're able to forgive, even if they never came to you and asked for it. Yes, you can forgive and you ought to, even if they don't ever ask for it. Now, you should labor that they ask for their good, that they could be reconciled, that they could walk, but you don't need it, that's the whole point, you're free already. Secondly, what about repeat offenders, what if they keep coming back and coming back? Well, I think we're back at the beginning of the sermon, aren't we? Isn’t that what Peter said, “How many times shall I forgive my…” Alright, you guys have up to 490 times, okay, so that you forgive up to 490. The point is, as many as often as they need it. And third and most poignantly, what about my memories? What about my memories? Let's talk about a very serious sin, like adultery in a relationship, the husband and wife, the offended person wants to continue in the relationship, wants to cover the sin, but they ask this poignant question, “What do I do with my memories?” Well, one of the things, the key things that I've learned about atonement is that God doesn't actually remove the sin as though it never happened. Why? Because he knows it did, he's not writing an alternate universe history in which it never happened. What he does is, he covers it in something more precious. That's the language that's used of atonement. It is the day of covering. And so it says, “Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are” what? “covered.” That's what you do for others. Cover the memory, cover it with the blood of Christ, cover with the grace and the mercy of God. Cover it, cover it, cover it, and as often as it pokes back up, cover it again, cover it until it doesn't need covering anymore. Cover it forever. Pretty soon there's gonna be a Bible for Life class, elective class on the need, reality, and power of forgiveness, Dr. Bob Hatch is gonna teach it. I urge you, if you can get away, to come and listen. This could be an issue for you. Close with me in prayer.

Widely differing images of Jesus proliferated as the silent film era wound down. With the success of DeMille's silent 1923 The Ten Commandments, a new consortium, MGM, in 1924 optioned the rights to General Lew Wallace's Ben Hur for an astounding $600,000. The resulting film, though focused on Judah Ben Hur, included many vignettes featuring a hardly human, distant, and anonymous Jesus. Following the success of Ben Hur, DeMille filmed the iconic cinematic life of Jesus, The King of Kings, which proved to be the climax of silent film epics. DeMille's Jesus appears as miracle worker and healer. Unlike the Jesus of Ben Hur, the King of Kings Jesus proves approachable, human, and huggable, as scenes with children and first-ever cinematic close-ups of Jesus dramatize.

The muscular version of Victorian Christianity exemplified in Ben Hur connects quintessentially masculine Judah Ben Hur with Jesus, the man of sorrow. The Social Gospel grounded in the same search for the historical Jesus evident in Ben Hur took shape also in an 1896 novel by Charles Sheldon, In His Steps. Sheldon's large cast of contemporary characters repeatedly posed the question "What would Jesus do?" The answer, according to Sheldon, involves paternalistic sacrifice that inevitably brings reward to the one sacrificing. Christians, says Sheldon, can together address and solve any problem, particularly poverty, by rightly filling their socially and culturally defined roles. A quarter century later ad man Bruce Barton realized explicitly Sheldon's implicit portrayal of Jesus in his novelized self-help book The Man Nobody Knows. Barton's Jesus discovers himself in the course of a ministry in which he occupies himself with modern roles such as the executive, the outdoorsman, the great salesman, and the founder of modern business.

I. A Tale of Two Cities If you would, look with me at Habakkuk chapter 2, which Warren read for us, a tremendous passage of Scripture. And we're going to see in there a tale of two empires. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was the age of wisdom. It was the age of foolishness. It was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity. It was the season of light, it was the season of darkness. It was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. We had everything before us, we had nothing before us. We were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way." That's how Charles Dickens began his famous novel, "A Tale of Two Cities. It's a story of Paris and London during the time of the French Revolution. Each of those cities represented something different, something that was going on in history. And so Dickens wrote and represented Paris and London, each of them representing what was going on in their own countries. And yet this concept, a tale of two cities, I think also represents what God has been doing, what has been happening in human history since the very beginning, or really, I would like to adjust it and say, A Tale of Two empires. One for the glory of God and one for the glory and praise of man. Saint Augustine writing a book called The City of God saw this exact same theme, the city of God and the city of the devil or Man. 410 AD Alaric and the Goths sacked Rome, bringing the Western Roman Empire to an end. Many feared this meant the end of the world, but it was not so. And, Augustine three years later, began writing his great work City of God. The basic concept is that human history can be seen as a battle between these two cities, the city of God and the city of the devil. The city of God is the heavenly Jerusalem, the company of God's people. The city of the devil is man's city on earth, one human empire after another. They rise, they dominate, they swagger then they stagger they fall and they sink back into the dust. And yet the city of God continues always to advance against the backdrop of this rise and fall of the world. The city of God advances, under the hand of God, and the Scripture teaches here in Habakkuk 2 that the city of man also rises and falls under the hand of God. Augustine wrote it this way, "These things being so, we do not attribute the power of giving kingdoms and empires to any save the true God who gives happiness in the Kingdom of Heaven to the pious alone but gives kingly power on Earth both to the pious and the impious as it may please him whose good pleasure is always just." What is Augustine saying? He's saying you can't make any sense of the kingdoms of the world. Some kings are good and wise and righteous and they rule well, other kings are insane, megalomaniacs who use their power to dominate and to crush. Kingdoms are given to wicked and sane men, kingdoms given to Jews, who worship God, kingdoms also given to Babylonians who worship their own military prowess. And no one can make heads or tails of it. No one can trace out God's ways, but yet they are perfect anyway. God in the end, judges wicked men, wicked rulers for how they use their position of authority, and in the end only one Empire will stand, and that is the glorious empire of the kingdom of God. For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Human History: A Tale of Two Empires Now, as we look at human history and see this tale of two empires we see the Empire of human glory rising forth from the earth, snarling like a beast going forth conquering and to conquer, always greedy for more, following the drive and genius initially of a single powerful leader. He organizes his tribe into a military machine, sleek hungry, and powerful. They move out, they take on their own oppressors and they beat them, they dominate them, they pay them back in fold for what they did to them. But they're not satisfied, are they? Because just over the next ridge is a peaceful valley with good fertile farm land. Those people have never done anything to them, but they're hungry, they're greedy, and off they go and they continue to conquer. Why? Because they can. They're powerful enough, and no one can stop them. And they do it over and over again, until there are no foes left to fight. Then the truly great ones stop and consolidate and they begin to build. They make monuments to their own glory, to the praise of their own name. They build Colosseums and arches, and great walls and fortresses. They build monuments to their greatness. What do they use for material? Well, stolen and plundered materials, of course, things stripped from dead bodies, and taken from live ones and all of it goes into monuments for the praise of their glory. They use slave labor pressed by the whip into great building projects. The great pyramids of Egypt built that way, the Great Wall of China built that same way, Roman bridges and roads and Colosseums built that same way. They build also fortifications to protect and consolidate their power. Great Walls, like the wall of Babylon and others, watchtowers, Ramparts they build up their military strength so that they can... It says in the words of Habakkuk, set their nest on high to escape the clutches of ruins, so they think. And so, they consolidate their power. And then they enjoy it. They bask in stolen luxury, they recline at feasts on the backs of slave labor. They grow fat, they grow lazy, rich and comfortable, ripe for the plucking themselves, and soon their day comes and it comes on like a tidal wave and nothing can stop it for the next human empire has arisen and it stands on the horizon ready to sweep down into their valley and take what's theirs. Their empire then is gone forever. It's dust in the wind. It's just recorded on the pages of history book. The next empire has its hay day and off it goes. Taken from the former empire, the gold is melted down and made into new idols, made into new monuments. And so the cycle of history continues. This, my friends, is the history of the world, the rise and fall of the empire of human glory. Represented in one incarnation after the other but it's the same thing again and again. Egypt then Assyria, then Babylon, then Persia, then Greece, then Rome, then the Huns then the Saracens, then the Franks, then the Mongols, then the Turks, then the Spanish, then the French, then the English, then the American. The rise and fall of the world. Some say the Europeans that came and swept North, Central and South America of the Indians were unjust and acted unfairly. It is true but do you understand what the Indians did before they came. The Aztecs built mighty empires with monuments to their own glory on the backs of slave labor until the conquistadors came in and conquered them. It's always been the same. There's no difference. The Mystery of God’s Purposes Now, the Scripture teaches plainly that the rise and fall of the world that I've been describing is all done under the sovereign hand of a mighty God who rules all of it through his inscrutable wisdom and for His own purposes. We already saw this in the book of Daniel, Daniel 4:17. It says, "The Most High is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone he wishes and sets over them the lowliest of men," Daniel 4:34-35, "His dominion is an eternal dominion. His kingdom endures from generation to generation, all the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as He pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth, no one can hold back his hand or say to him, 'What have you done?'" Do you know who said those words? The king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar. He recognized the sovereign hand of God, even in his own power. God's way cannot be traced out but his overall purpose is clear. He's building an eternal empire for His own glory. Look at Habakkuk 2:12-14. The contrast is striking. It says there, "Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by crime. Has not the Lord Almighty determined that the people's labor is only fuel for the fire, that the nations exhaust themselves for nothing. For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." Do you see the contest going on in those verses? The one, the empire of human glory, the other, the empire of God's glory. And who wins in the end? God does. His empire rises and it stands forever. Now Habakkuk 2, we have to understand in context, I've been giving you the historical context, big picture, but there's a specific historical context that Habakkuk faced and what was it? Well, it was the end of the history of Jewish autonomy and rule over the promised land, it's the end over Jerusalem. And why? Because God had brought these people, the Jews into the promised land and given them the Mosaic covenant, and they did not keep the covenant, they broke it and despite repeated warnings from prophets, they broke it completely. And so God was ready to judge the people. Now, before the final judgment came, there were prophets who saw what was happening in Judah, and in Jerusalem. Habakkuk was one of them, and he looked at his own people and he saw injustice. He saw the people using their power, judges, rulers, commissioners, military people, all those in positions of authority, using it to dominate the poor, to strip them, to plunder them, to throw them in jail and take their houses so that they could build their own mini-empires. It's always the same thing. Building a little mini-empire within Judah, within Jerusalem, adding house to house, it says in the book of Isaiah. As the rich get richer on the backs of the poor through injustice. Habakkuk sees it and says, "How long, O Lord. Must I cry to you for help, but you do not listen, cry out to you violence but you do not save." "When are you going to do something about this, God?" Chapter 1 Verse 5. I have an answer for you, Habakkuk. "Look at the nations and watch and be utterly amazed. For I'm going to do something in your days that you would not believe even if you were told. I'm raising up the Babylonians, that ruthless, and impetuous people who sweep across the whole earth to seize dwelling places not their own." They're going to come in like a flood, Habakkuk, and they're going to destroy Jerusalem. They're going to deport the remnant and those who are the blessed ones, the faithful ones, the rest are going to die by the sword, famine, and plague. Judgement is coming, Habakkuk. Habakkuk 1:12, He laments, he grieves, he says, "Oh, God, my Holy One…" "Righteous One, what are you doing?" "Your eyes are too pure to look on evil, you cannot tolerate wrong. Why then do you tolerate the treacherous? Why are you silent while the wicked swallow up those more righteous than themselves?" How can you allow this to happen, God? You're holy and just and we are sinners. It's true, but the Babylonians are pagans and you're going to use them to evict us from our city, from our home? Wouldn't a revival go better? Wouldn't it be better to refresh us from within God? Could I give you some advice, I don't want to question you, but I don't understand what you're doing. And so, I will stand at my watch and I will station myself on the ramparts and I will wait and see what answer you will give. What are you doing, God. It doesn't make any sense. Habakkuk 2 is God's answer. I will explain myself. He basically gives him a four-part answer. You have to look across the whole chapter to get this, but the first answer is The Babylonians are going to get theirs in turn. They will be destroyed. The nation invading you will in turn be destroyed. Secondly, the nation that rises up after them to destroy them will in turn be destroyed as well. They're going to labor, they're going to struggle, they're going to build their own empire, but their labor is only fuel for the fire. Thirdly, I am building a kingdom for my own glory, I'm building an empire and it's spreading from shore to shore. And people all over the world will know my glory and they will praise and worship and honor me, that is my kingdom. And I'm going to keep working at it until I'm finished. Number four, individual people can enter my Kingdom, only one way, through faith. Simple faith in God, we understand simple faith in Jesus Christ as the only provision for salvation. That's a four-part answer in Habakkuk Chapter 2. The first three are big picture, what is God doing in the world with empires, the moving of one and another, the sweeping one side or the other, and in the end there's this kingdom being built and then the individual answer comes through, believe, trust obey, follow and enter the kingdom of God, that's the answer. II. Message #1: Babylon Will Be Destroyed in Turn Well, let's look more carefully at this first answer, namely that Babylon will be destroyed in turn. Habakkuk is concerned about God's justice, isn't he? It seems unjust it seems that God's ways don't make any sense. And so Habakkuk is filled with anguish and he prays, and he needs an answer. Now, Babylon is not specifically mentioned in Habakkuk 2, isn't that interesting? And that's why I know that it applies through all ages. It's not just Babylon that he has in mind here, but in the end, Babylon is in view. Look at chapter 3:16. Chapter 3:16, this is Habakkuk's answer. "I heard, and my heart pounded. My lips quivered at the sound. Decay crept into my bones and my legs trembled. Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us." And who's that? That's Babylon. So Habakkuk interprets the answer in Habakkuk 2 to be applied to Babylon, and so it is. He's speaking about Babylon. Now, he describes the enemy very carefully in verses 4-5, look with me as he describes him. Verse 4, it says, "See he is puffed up, his desires are not upright but the righteous will live by his faith. Indeed wine betrays him, he is arrogant never at rest. Because he is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied, he gathers to himself all the nations, and takes captive all the peoples." Arrogance So what do we see first? First, we see arrogance. See, he is puffed up, he's puffed up. You see that in verse 4. It all starts with a lofty self opinion in one individual, one talented individual. I'm not going to deny that, but one individual starts to look inward and find what's there. And says, "Wow, I'm really something, aren't I? I can go places, maybe even to the end of the earth if I'm good enough." And he starts to move out, the future conqueror ultimately really worships himself, doesn't he? He starts with small successes within his own tribe, he's able to consolidate, maybe overcome some local opposition. He's able to maybe work together a consolidation or a coalition of tribes and they start to get powerful and off they go. He's got energy, he's got intelligence, he's got leadership, he's got personal magnetism, he has a unique vision of the times, and of other nations. And He begins to believe himself to be invincible. You can stick in any of the conquerors names there, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Hitler, all of them, they're all the same, one after the other. Unrighteous Desires After that comes unrighteous desires. Look, it says his desires are not upright. What does that mean? Well, he sets his heart on unrighteous things, ultimately, he wants to be worshipped. He also wants a comfortable lifestyle with luxury and ease. He covets other people's lands and houses and farms and women and gold and silver and everything. He wants it for himself. But more than anything, he sets his heart on individual personal glory. He wants to make a name for himself. Genesis 11:4, they built a tower to reach up to heaven, Tower of Babel. "Then they said, 'come let us build ourselves a city with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves.'" Do you hear that? That's the same motivation. And that was Babylon the spirit of Babylon. Let's make a name for myself. And then what does it say? It says after the statement we've already looked at the righteous will live by his faith, verse 5, "indeed wine betrays him." what an interesting thing to say. Where does wine come in at this moment? It's an odd thing. Well, I've done a careful study of wine in Habakkuk 2. And I think that wine is in a small way, the fermented result of putting grapes in a certain place, and you drink it and you get drunk. That's the literal interpretation. We're following the literal interpretation. And so in one sense, he's a drunkard. But I don't think that's the ultimate meaning of wine in Habakkuk 2. I think it has to do in terms of the conqueror with an arrogant overbearing self-confidence that goes beyond the boundaries that are reasonable. He is confident that he can do anything. Nothing is too difficult for him. That's the conqueror. What about the conquered? It's the drunkenness of being conquered, the drunkenness of terror and fear and running around like you're insane, the night before the battle because you know you're going to get killed the next day. And there's terror in that, and there's a wine that gets poured out and you drink and it's the wine of destruction. This theme is repeated again and again in the prophetic books. And so I think that's what's going on here. Initially, it's wine. And I think, actually, literally wine is involved all the time, right? When men fought battles they would get drunk because they lacked the courage to face getting skewered with the sword the next day, and the conquered would also drink the night before the battle because they were terrified themselves. But the conqueror has an over-confidence and wine is ultimately going to betray him. Talk about drinking and driving, one of the greatest dangers of people who drink and then drive, is that they have an over-inflated confidence of what they can do, they're convinced they can stop in time. They're convinced they can drive twice the speed limit around that curve. And yet they're impaired by their over-confidence, they're impaired by the wine, the alcohol, and they crash and die. And I think that's ultimately what it means here. Wine betrays him. He thinks he can do anything. 1941, Adolf Hitler had an army sitting in France and all over and he couldn't cross the channel to get into England, didn't know what to do with it, so he figured he would go Eastward and invade Russia. Never invade Russia. Russia is huge with limitless resources of manpower and there's always one more mountain ridge and one more and it's like, a funnel that just keeps getting wider and wider. And after a year of fighting, he's on a 1500-mile front. What was he thinking? I can do anything, wine betrays him, he loses the war as a result. And so it is with every conqueror. They always overreach themselves. Restlessness Thirdly, restlessness. It says, "He is arrogant and never at rest." The restlessness is Satan-like. Job 1:7, "The Lord said to Satan, 'Where have you come from?' And Satan answered the Lord, 'From roaming through the earth and going back and forth in it.'" He's not satisfied because only God satisfies. And so he's got to move, he's got to go conquer. Restlessness is caused by discontent. He's not satisfied with what God's given him, and so he rides forth for more. That leads immediately to greed. Look at verse 5, "Because he is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied, he gathers to himself all the nations, and takes captive all the peoples." A fire never says, "I've had enough logs tonight, no more. I'm fine, I'm satisfied." Fire is always going to take one more log. The grave never says, "We've had enough dying this month. I have my quota, no more death, I'm finished for the month, maybe next month we'll get going again, but it's enough." No, the grave is never satisfied. There's always room for one more. And so it is with the conqueror. He always thinks there's room for one more. Alexander the Great after the Greeks had reached the Punjab region of India, they came to the Hyphasis River and refused to cross it. The army said, "No more." [chuckle] How much is enough for you? They had conquered 27 different regions. He built Alexandrias all over the world, not just the one in Egypt that still bears his name, but everywhere there was an Alexandria. How many more cities do you want to your name? When is it enough? He says, gather the army, I've got to talk to them. So they come out and he starts to persuade them to keep going. This is Alexander the Great, that's what he says, this is from a historian, Arrian, "All Libya to eastward will soon be ours and all Asia too, and to this empire there will be no boundaries, but what God himself has made for the whole world." Boy, he's ambitious. "Gentlemen of Macedon and you, my friends and allies, we must not halt. Stand firm, for well you know that hardship and danger are the price of glory and that sweet is the savor of a life of courage and of deathless fame beyond the grave." What is motivating him there? The glory of his own name. It's never enough. Ultimately, he wept because the army wouldn't go any further. All of that leads to power. He wants to control, it's a disposition to dominate. He wants to control. And so in verse five, again, "He is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied. He gathers to himself all the nations, and takes captive all the peoples." The culmination is relentless empire building, this is the spirit of Babylon. The Prophet’s Response Now, what does the Prophet say to this? What is the answer to such a spirit? Well, God gives in Habakkuk 2 a five-fold woe. Now the word woe to a prophet, is a word of impending judgment that has not come yet, the prophet sees it coming and through his mouth, through his words, he is speaking judgment from God. And so five times the word of woe was spoken to the suppressor. Look at verse 5-6, "Because he is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied, he gathers to himself all the nations, and takes captive all the peoples. Will not all of them taunt him with ridicule and scorn saying, Woe to him." Now, here at last, the oppressed, the prayers and hopes of the oppressed start to rise up to heaven and they're crying for deliverance from these oppressors, from the boot of the oppressor. And so up it goes and they start to cry, they have nowhere else to turn to. Just as Habakkuk did it in chapter one. They start to pray. And the prayer is answered. The conquest comes, the former conqueror is toppled and what happens then is what we call in the Bible a taunt song. They have a celebration, they sing a song. How many of you have seen the movie Ben-Hur? It's my favorite movie, I love that movie. Just watching it with the kids the other day and the stories of a Jewish, a powerful ruler, a rich man and his friend, Messala is that his name? Yes, Messala, and they were boyhood friends got along great when things were simple but they each grew up. He went over to Rome, Messala did and rose in the Roman Army and became drunk with the glory of Rome, and brought that drunkenness back to his so-called friendship with Judah Ben Hur. And he tried to enlist Ben-Hur's help in betraying his own people. And they start to discuss and they start to yell and argue and in the end, there's no reconciling the two of them. And Messala said to Judah Ben-Hur, "Look to the west, look to Rome, that's where the real glory is, that's where the real power is, it's not that." Pointing up to heaven. "Not that." And Ben-Hur looks at him and says, "I tell you that Rome is an affront to God." I can't say it like Charlton Heston, he said, God better than anyone I've ever... "Rome is an affront to God and on the day Rome falls there will be a cry and a shout of freedom such as not been heard in history." Well, it's heard again and again, isn't it? When the oppressor is finally toppled, the taunt song goes up, and that's what Habakkuk 2 is. The woes really come from the lips of the conquered again and again, but really from God. Look at verse 6, "Woe to him who piles up stolen goods, and makes himself wealthy by extortion." Look at verse 9, "Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain to set his nest on high, to escape the clutches of ruin." Verse 12, "Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed, and establishes a town by crime." Verse 15, "Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbors pouring it from the wineskin till they are drunk so that he can gaze on their naked bodies." Verse 19, "Woe to him who says to wood, come to life or to lifeless stone wake up." All of these are immediately directed to ruthless conquering Babylon. But, they're really for anybody who meets the description. Anybody. Now, why does God's justice come? Well, because wicked corrupt hearts lead to wicked corrupt actions. It's not necessarily corrupt to conquer because Joshua conquered under the direction of God. But if you have wicked motives and your motive is not the glory of God, then you cannot conquer and be held guiltless. And so out of these corrupt motives, pride, unrighteous desires, discontent, covetousness, greed, evil plotting and love of ease, comes wicked actions. Now, what do I mean by love of ease? Look at verse 9, "Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain to set his nest on high to escape the clutches of ruin." What is that? Well, I know that when we conquer you, you're going to be angry at us, and you're going to want to come after us, so we're going to make Babylon so strong that there's nothing you can do. We're going to make the walls 350 feet high, so wide at the top that you can drive a chariot with four horses. We're going to have a river running right through the center of the city, we're going to have farmland within the walls of the city, you'll never be able to starve us. We're going to stock up food enough for three years, are you going to bring food enough for yourself for three years? No sieging army can handle that. And we've got 100 bronze gates and we've got ramparts so high you can't even see them. And you cannot conquer us. That's what they're doing, they're setting their nest on high to escape the clutches of ruin and so they're easy and they're comfortable. Jeremiah 51:53 says, "Even if Babylon reaches the sky and fortifies her lofty stronghold, I will send destroyers against her, declares the Lord." Ultimately the wicked motive is self-glorification. Isaiah 47:7, "You said, I will continue forever, the eternal queen." That's Babylon's attitude. Well, what wicked actions? Well look at it. Look at verse 6, "Woe to him who piles up stolen goods, and makes himself wealthy by extortion. How long must this go on?" This is violence, this is extortion, plunder. Look at verse 9, "Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain." Then there's murder and destruction. Verse 8, "You have shed man's blood, you have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them." He says it again in verse 17, Cruelty, "The violence you've done to Lebanon will overwhelm you and your destruction of animals will terrify you, for you've shed man's blood, you've destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them." III. Judgment Predicted: Your Victims Will Arise God is perfectly just and he's not going to tolerate or accept this, and so judgment comes. And it's an interesting kind of judgment. Who is going to do the justice? Who is going to conquer Babylon? Well, their own victims will. Look at verse 7 and 8, "Will not your debtors suddenly arise. Will they not wake up and make you tremble, then you will become their victim. Because you have plundered many nations, the peoples who are left will plunder you." You see conquerors that rule in ease, they get lazy and fat and comfortable and easy. And they're prime picking for those that have built up years of resentment. And so, they rise up and overthrow their tyrants. Look at verses 15 and following, "Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbors, pouring it from the wineskin till they are drunk so that he can gaze on their naked bodies." I don't think this is talking about some perverted drunken feast. I think what's going on is, this is the language of conquest and you're going around to your neighbors and you're going to pour out the cup of conquest to your neighbors. Now, says God, it is your turn. The cup from the Lord's right hand is coming around to you. Now you drink and you get exposed, you will be stripped, you'll be left for dead. That's what he's saying. The cup from the Lord's right hand is coming around to you and disgrace will cover your glory. The violence you've done to Lebanon will overwhelm you and your destruction of animals will terrify you. Isn't that interesting? The way you handled animals when you invaded, I see it all. Sparrow doesn't fall to the ground apart from the will of God. I watched, I saw, for you have shed man's blood, you've destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them. Well, what happened? Well, the book of Daniel tells us what happened, you remember Daniel Chapter 5, Belshazzar's feast. Belshazzar King of Babylon invited all these nobles to come in and drink from the cups that were taken from the temple of God, blasphemy. And they drank and they celebrated the gods of wood and iron and clay, and stone and that very night, Belshazzar died at the hands of the Medes and the Persians, because they crawled under the wall of Babylon and opened the gate while everyone was drunk. Everyone was sleeping it off and Babylon fell in a single night. IV. Summary and Application Now, what application do we take from this? Well, if you were Habakkuk there in Jerusalem so long ago and you know that the Babylonians are coming, you feel terror, you feel pain, you wonder what God is doing. And then when God answers, in effect, he's saying Wait for me. Wait joyfully for my powerful word. Habakkuk asked for wisdom, this Habakkuk 2 is God's answer, this is what's coming. Now, how long is that going to take, God? Okay, for the conquerors come in and go through that whole cycle, that's seems like it's going to be a while. I'm an old man. Yeah, it's going to be a while. Wait patiently for God's word to be fulfilled. God's word will be fulfilled no matter how improbable it seems. Habakkuk took that word and believed it and rejoiced. Look again at Chapter 3:16 and following. He hears, he's afraid, and yet he makes a commitment. He says, "I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us." And then he says this, "Though the fig tree does not bud, and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pens and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will be joyful in God, my Savior." It's easy for a pagan to be happy when things are good. A believing person can rejoice when things are devastatingly difficult. So wait patiently for God's word. Secondly, be humbled by God's sovereignty. You look at that and say the nations are rising and falling, what can we do about it? The answer is nothing. But God rules over it all, the God that you love, the God that you call your Father is navigating history. That includes what's going on in Afghanistan. That includes what's going on in our country. That includes what's going on in Jerusalem right today, how appropriate is that? That includes all the events of human history. God is absolutely sovereign over all of it. Be humbled by that. Realize the limit to your own power. And God doesn't owe us any explanation for what he's doing. Thirdly, never doubt God's perfect justice. Some of God's ways seem unjust. It could be that some time this week something will happen to you that will make you question God's justice. I hope not. Don't ever question God's justice. God is always righteous in everything he does. He knows what he's doing. And his justice is perfect and right. And then ultimately, I want to urge you to flee to the only place of safety. There is one, and that is Jesus Christ. Look again at verse 4, it says there, "The righteous will live by his faith." The righteous will live by his faith. I don't have any idea what's happening in your hearts as you're listening to me. Do you realize what we've described is a picture of judgment from God? The Babylonians came to judge God's people. The Babylonians themselves in turn will be judged. Do you realize that Judgment Day is coming? Are you ready for it? Are you ready to face and stand before a holy judge, who knows everything you've ever said or done? Are you righteous enough for that? There's no safety anywhere except in the blood of Jesus Christ. The cross of Christ alone is a safe refuge in the ebbs and flows of history, regardless of what you're going through. The cross of Jesus Christ alone because Jesus died on the cross, the wrath of God is turned away for all who believe in Him. The righteous will live by faith. And then having trusted in Christ, you just go through the ebbs and flows of history over which you have so little control and you accept the things that God has given you by faith. And even if the fig tree doesn't bud and there are no grapes on the vine, even if the most terrible things you can imagine happen in your life, yet you can rejoice in God your Savior. In the end God will bring you into His Heavenly Kingdom. Trust in Christ, trust in his blood, have faith in him regardless of what's going on in human history, God is building his empire for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.