Hickory Bible Church

The Wisdom of God

David Duncan

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The Wisdom of God

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Well. Good morning, Church. It's, great to see everybody gathered all together. It's always exciting during the summer when we get together in one service. And since nobody has stolemy line. And I was very, very appreciative of Adam and Chris reserving this for me, I just want to be the first to welcome everybody to our stupendous Single Service Summer series. I like saying that every year. Once a year I get to say that with great conviction. Well, we've been examining the attributes of God. It's our great God. And I hope you've been blessed by the messages thus far. And it's my joy this week to preach on the wisdom of God. Um, let me pray, and then we'll kind of get into it. So, Father, we are...I'm overwhelmed. And I pray by the end of this sermon, we're all overwhelmed with your greatness, who you truly are, Father, that you are perfect wisdom. And so I pray, Lord, as this sermon is preached that you would give wisdom and discernment to everyone that hears, Lord. That you would, through your spirit, instruct us through your word. And Lord, that we be blessed to know you more. In Christ's name, Amen.
So I got the little sheet that you get when you come in. There's four points on there. And  my mother in law, had hers and she said, four points. How long are you going to preach? And I said, well, I got three sub points under each of the four points. I said, I'm  preaching to either my new knee that was replaced two months ago gives out, or you walk out...either with your way. That's how long I'm going to preach this morning. But go ahead and turn in your Bibles to Romans 16:27, Romans 16:27. That's Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Acts and the epistle to the Romans. So get to Romans 16. Last chapter in the book, last verse in that chapter. And I will be using a number of various texts this morning, simply because I believe the Word of God does a lot better job explaining our topic than I can. And so, as a help of the majority of the scriptures that I'll be using and referencing today will be up on the overheads and the screens as I preach through them. Now, as you know, if you've ever heard me preacher teach, I'm a guy that has to and likes to look up definitions for my own clarity sake. I need to really understand what the word means, and I'm not implying that I'm not smart enough to know it before I look it up, but I have to look it up. SoI use my fancy Logos Bible software to get an exact definition of what an attribute is. And an attribute is a grammatical term for a descriptive word or phrase that modifies a noun. Well I gotta be honest with you, that didn't help me a whole lot. Uh, my third grade teacher daughter may understand that, but I did not understand that. So I got out my old Webster's dictionary. The old trusty Webster's, you know, was red, got that texture to it, and it says this. An attribute is a quality, character or characteristic ascribed to someone or something. You get that? A quality, or a characteristic ascribed to someone or something. So as an example in my life, my wife is lovely. Therefore, an attribute of my wife to me is her loveliness. Okay, so that's an attribute. So as we continue our series on the attributes of God, I believe it is helpful also to establish a little clarity by mentioning that there are two basic categories that are typically placed and mentioned about God when it comes to attributes...from a systematic perspective. Now, there have been different names over the centuries from different theologians, but the two categories that are most likely and most typically used are the category of communicable attributes and incommunicable attributes. I looked those up too. It comes out of the Latin word communist and it means shared. So therefore a communicable attribute is an attribute that belongs to God, but that he shares with his people, with mankind. And an incommunicable attribute, therefore, is a quality of God that he has only within himself. It cannot be shared outside of God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the Triune God. Everybody get that...communicable, shared...incommunicable cannot be shared. And the sermons thus far in our series have provided perfect examples of each of these two categories. Two weeks ago, Adam preached on God's eternality and he spoke about the IS of God's aseity...that God has no beginning and no end, and God is the only necessary being, and as such is independent and self-existent. Meaning that the Triune God, the God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit needs nothing or no one outside of their self. This is an incommunicable attribute because we, as Adam taught us, are contingent beings. We're dependent beings. Therefore, most certainly we are not eternal. We have a beginning and we are not self-existent. We literally every person sitting here relies on God for your very next breath. We need to understand that. And then last week, Chris preached about God's attribute of mercy. And he brought in Luke 6:36 where it says, be merciful, just as your father is merciful. So see, we as created beings are commanded to show mercy and be merciful, because God has communed mercy to us. That's why we have the capability to show mercy. So it's a communicable attribute of God. Everybody tracking with me. We got our buckets. I like buckets.
So keep these two categories in mind throughout the rest of our series. And in particular this morning as we look at Romans 16:27 where we get our title for the sermon, The Wisdom of God, and which is also our first point. And really, it is the primary point of this entire message. And that is, God is wisdom. So here in 16:27, Paul is closing out his letter to the church in Rome, and he finishes with this proclamation. To the only wise God, through Jesus Christ be the glory forever. Amen. The NASB, the LSB, the ESV all translated that way. The King James says to God only wise. And I personally prefer the new King James here for clarity. It says to God alone, wise...to God alone, wise. See, Paul's making the point that we have to get right out of the gate this morning, and that is this.  
That it is God that is only wise. Or my new favorite omni that I learn in a resource the elders did a couple of years ago. God is omni sapient. I had never heard that term. Omni means all or of all things. Sapient is wise wisdom. God is omni-sapient, all wise. And as we'll study this morning, the implications of this truth are astounding. So as we dig into our first point, I want to address something that I believe is an issue for most of us when we think about God. At least it is for me, and especially when we think about those communicable attributes. I believe there's a tendency for us to reduce the truth of exactly who God is. It's because we think of him about in ways that diminish his absolute transcendence of who he truly is. Now, I don't think we do this maliciously. Um, I think we do it mistakenly, due to our puny little minds and our inability to really comprehend our transcendent God. I believe we tend to place the Triune God of all on some continuum of a created order. You know, like we go from a small creature, like a mouse, and then we work it up to a bigger creature, like a dog. And then maybe you get to a bigger creature like a monkey until you get to a human, and then we get to God. Does that make sense? It's like we put him on this continuum, and it's because our finite minds are trying to comprehend an infinite God, a transcendent triune God. And in my opinion, this puny mind thinking continues, I believe, as we think about the attributes of God. We make the mistake of thinking in this manner. God has goodness. God has love. God has justice. God has mercy. God has grace. God has power. God has knowledge. God has wisdom, etc.. Instead, the truth is God is goodness. God is love. God is justice. God is mercy. God is grace. I'm from the South. Another way of saying it is God cannot not be good. God cannot not be loving. God cannot not be merciful. He cannot not be just. He cannot not be gracious. God is omnipresent...that he is always present everywhere at every time with the fullness of who he is. God is omnipotent. That means he's all powerful. He is able to do anything consistent with his desires as God. God is omniscient. He has all knowledge. That is, he has complete knowledge of all things at all times. And as Adam taught us, another omni you may have never heard of...God is omni-temporal. Now this is mind blowing to think of these all of time is present to him at all times simultaneously. And our topic today God is omni-sapient. God is all wise. That is, he always understands what is best. And you need to get this. It's not that just God has wisdom. God is wisdom. And praise be to God, as we'll see before this message is done. He demonstrates that wisdom and he cannot be unwise. So the first question to me is what is wisdom? I mean, I was just thinking about that. I was preparing for the message you're going to preach on wisdom. You better know what it is. And as I thought about the topic, and I had discussion with people that I felt like a lot more intelligent than me, I found that in my own mind and even those minds of others, there seems to be a conflation or a confusion of knowledge and wisdom...that knowledge and wisdom kind of get lumped together. And so, although they're closely aligned, there is a difference between wisdom and knowledge. Now, when discussing this with my baby brother this past week, not my little brother, my little brother's Matthew, my baby brother's Mark. Now my baby brother is 48 years old, married man with a bunch of kids, but he's still my baby brother. And then being a baby brother, he had the answer...because baby brothers know. He said, absolutely, there's a difference. And he gave me the following example to use and I will use it now with his permission. It is knowledge to know a tomato is a fruit. It is wisdom to know a tomato does not go in a fruit salad. Now though, that is somewhat that is a very somewhat helpful explanation in probably most situations we will encounter. I think we need a tad more depth to our definition this morning when we think about the wisdom of God and the fact that God is all wise. As one theologian succinctly put it, knowledge is the apprehension of a thing, and wisdom is the appointing and ordering of things. I mean, knowledge is knowing, but wisdom is applying the knowledge. Or, as Heath Lambert was so helpful when he writes in that same resource where I learned what omni sapient was. Heath wrote, Omni sapient...all wise, builds on divine omniscience, all knowing. In fact, we would say quite strongly that omniscience would come very near to being worthless if God did not understand what is best. And Scripture proclaims it best in Romans 11, verses 33 through 36, where Paul writes, oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and unfathomable his ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, who became his counselor, or who is first given to him, that it might be paid back to him again? For from him and through him, and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen. In Daniel 2:20 Daniel writes, let the name of God be blessed forever. For wisdom and power belong to him. Job in chapter 12:13 and verse 16 say, with him are wisdom and might. To him belong counsel and understanding. With him are strength and sound wisdom. The misled and the misleader belong to him. Y'all get that everything belongs to him. And as I studied and read about the attribute of wisdom over the last several weeks, so many times it truly caused my mind just to be blown, um, completely overwhelmed. I mean, where things were spinning and tears were flowing and prayers of assent were the only response to really meditate on the omnis of God and beg the Holy Spirit to, as much as possible, give understanding of who God is in relation to us as a created being is an overwhelming thing, and my hope and prayer is that everyone will leave here and do that very thing. Just think about the fact that God is wisdom. He does not need anything or anyone to weigh his options as we do. He doesn't need to go outside of himself for counsel. He doesn't need to search for wisdom. He doesn't need to understand. We need to get wisdom. He is wisdom. He is only wise. He's solely and fully possesses all wisdom. Or as 1 Timothy 1:17 exclaims, now under the King, eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory, forever and ever. Amen. Tozer, in his book Knowledge of the Holy. We did this as a life group a few years ago, and it was such a blessing to me that somebody in the group said, hey, let's just do this resource. And man, it was impactful. He writes this and this is very helpful. The idea of God as infinitely wise is at the root of all truth. It is the datum. The word datum means basis. I told y'all I gotta look stuff up. It is the datum, the basis of belief necessary to the soundness of all other beliefs about God. Wisdom, among other things, is the ability to devise perfect ends and to achieve those ends by the most perfect means. It sees the end from the beginning, so there could be no need to guess or conjecture. Wisdom sees everything in focus, each in proper relation to all, and is thus able to work forward predestined goals with flawless precision. See, God's decisions about what he does are always wise decisions. That is, they always will bring about the best results from God's ultimate perspective, and they will bring about those results through the best possible means. And I believe it's fair to say that in the midst of life's trials, because life is hard. But for those of us in Christ, it is a truth that gives us hope because he is a good and wise and loving Father. Isaiah 40:14 says, with whom did he consult, and who gave him understanding, and who taught him in the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and informed him in the way of understanding. And as I already pointed out, the answer is no one. No one has given him understanding. And lastly, on this point, because God is all wise and because he knows the best means to get to the best ends for his glory. And since the Psalmist says in 21:30, there is no wisdom nor understanding apart from the Lord or against the Lord. We can rest assured in Psalm 33:11 that states, the counsel of the Lord stands forever. God is immutable, therefore his counsel is immutable, meaning he does not change, nor does his counsel change. It stands forever. And it is within the counsel of his own will that the first recorded display of God's wisdom is given to us in Genesis 1:1. It's his creation. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. God's wisdom first was displayed to us in creation. Proverbs 3:19 says, the Lord by wisdom founded the earth. By understanding he established the heavens. Jeremiah 10:12, it is he who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom and by his understanding, he has stretched out the heavens. The earth is the Lord's and everything in it, Psalm 24:1 says. Think about the wisdom of God as displayed in creation. I mean, creation is truly incredible. Stephen Charnock, who lived back in the 1600s, wrote this, and I love it. If God had made all the stars suns. Think about that. It would have been a demonstration of his power, but perhaps less of his wisdom. As God is wisdom, he is the only fount of true wisdom. All created beings, as angels and mankind, have what wisdom we have from him. And there's a natural order to creation that gives glory to God in His wisdom as it's displayed. This is the reason why Satan, who is the father of lies, John 8:44 and his world system are in a full out war to lie about creation. They want to lie about created order. They want to lie about mankind. He wants to lie about God is Creator, an attempt to steal God's glory, the glory that's due the maker, and to take as many souls to hell with him as possible. Just think of the lies and philosophies that have infiltrated not just our society and educational institutions, but even so-called churches that have been led to apostatize and deny God's wisdom as shown in creation. You've got deconstruction going on. That's the big thing nowadays. This philosophy is from the pit of hell, because the first deconstruction occurred in Genesis three, when the devil came up and talked to Adams woman, Eve, and said, indeed has God said... Let's deconstruct the truth that God gave. Let's build it back up the way we think it should be built up. What about critical theory and Marxism and racism that propagates the lie that there are many races and seeks to establish an oppressor and an oppressed and pit them against each other, when in fact there's one race, the human race with many ethnicities, but all having the same lineage. We're all sons and daughters of Adam and Eve, and because of the flood were all sons and daughters of Noah and his wife. That's why when I fill out paperwork for the doctor and they say race, I write human. Now, if you want to ask me what ethnicity I am, well, I guess I'm a Anglo-Saxon dude from Ireland and Scotland. But I'm. I'm human. That's the race I am. See, it's the diversity in our ethnicities that brings God glory for his creation. When you look around and see people that are different, that gives God glory, it's an expression of his creativity. Darwinism, the theory of evolution, big bang theory that we all came from some cosmic accident and evolved from...into a tadpole that eventually walked out of the water and evolved into a monkey that became a man. Now, this is just my mind. I'm always like, well, why ain't there no monkeys walking out the jungle now saying, hey, Bill, how you doing? Right? I mean, it's ludicrous, but it's infiltrated and is it is caused lies to be propagated against the creator and the creation. And because of the degradation of biblical moral absolutes related to creation and creation order and nature itself, coupled with the propagation of moral relativism that, you know, whatever's right to you, right to you when it's right for me is right for me. And the self-esteem movement of the 60s and 70s that have infiltrated the society and the church. We now have LGBTQIA+ religion ravaging our youth. According to Gallup's 2024 research, 23.1% of Gen Z. That's 97 to 2006 now claim to be in this category. Well, you know, it's a philosophy and a religion that's impacting because if you go to millennials, it's 14% and Gen X is at 5%. Baby boomers is 3%, and the silent generation is only 1.8%. They didn't hear those lies propagated that we hear today. We've even got something called furries. We have people walking around thinking that they're an animal. I mean, you laugh, but it's the truth. That's a lie against God's created order. These are all lies from the spirit of age against God first and foremost, and against God's order in creation. Because Genesis 1:26 and 27 says this, God said, let us make man in our image according to our likeness. The 'imago dei', God, created man in his own image, in the image of God, he created him, male and female, he created them. Those things are lies against God's created order and against God's own image that he's given to us as image bearers. That's why it's a serious situation. You see the Creator God all around us in the moon and the stars and oceans and tides and times and seasons. That's why I love the beach. I have to tell you, I hate. I hate being hot. Even this morning I went over and checked the air. I'm like, man alive. It feels hot in here. It's just me. And I don't like sand being all stuck to me. That's just miserable. But you know what I love? I love the sunrise. I love looking out at the ocean. I love listening to the waves. I love watching the birds. I love looking into the heavens and being overwhelmed by the greatness of God in creation. Um, we got to go to the beach this, uh, this year, and I love getting up early. I love drinking coffee, and I love praying. Psalm 19:1 says, the heavens are telling of the glory of God, and their expanse is declaring the work of his hands.  You see that picture? That's like at 6:10 a.m., the sun's just coming up. We see the wisdom of God, the Creator in life itself. I'm always amazed to think of the fact that a baby gets their nutrition for months and months by nursing from the mother. It's just incredible. And even in God's created order the first several days, it's colostrum, it's antibodies. It's all those things that baby needs to be healthy and this can just go on for months and months. Mama eats, baby gets to eat. Um, and what about this one? This is one of my wife's favorites...the woodpecker. According to the Audubon Society, the design of the head allows for the woodpecker to withstand up to 1500 g-force units. For perspective, a typical roller coaster causes us to experience five G force units. 99.7% of the energy from the woodpecker pecking is transferred to the body. So why doesn't he knock himself out or herself out? And the tongue goes in and it wraps around the brain. It's just incredible. And we could go on and on of the evidence of God's wisdom shown in creation. This is why Romans 1:20 so clearly states, for since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood through what has been made, so that they...humans, are without excuse. The evidence is all around us that an all wise God is the creator God, and his creation is the first example of God's wisdom being on display. The crown jewel of God's wisdom culminates in the person and work of His Son, Jesus Christ, and his redeeming work on the cross. God's mystery revealed to us the good news of salvation. See, God's wisdom culminates in the redemption. Galatians 4:4-5 tell us, but when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. Ephesians 3:8-11, Paul writes to me, the very least of all saints. This grace was given to preach to the Gentiles. That's us. The unfathomable riches of Christ and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God, who created all things, so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places. This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which he carried out. That's God carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord. 1 Corinthians 2:6-8, I told you scripture says it better than I can. So we're going to read the Bible. Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature. A wisdom, however, not of this age, nor of the rulers of this age who are passing away. But we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory. The wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood. Christ is the power and the wisdom of God. 1 Corinthians 1:24 and verse 30 say, but to those who are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Christ is literally the power of God and the wisdom of God. But by his doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God. And we see plainly in Colossians 2:2-3 that the mystery of God, which the prophets of old wrote about is Christ, where Paul writes that their hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love, and attaining to all wealth that comes from the assurance of understanding resulting in a true knowledge of God's mystery, that is, Christ Himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Which brings us full circle back to our focal verse. Romans 16:27. To the only wise God through Jesus Christ, to him be glory forever. Stephen Charnock again here was helpful to me when he wrote this. But we must not understand it as if God were wise by Jesus Christ. You catching that? We must not understand it if God were wise by Jesus Christ. But thanks is to be given to God through Jesus Christ, because in and by Christ, God has revealed wisdom to the world. Amen? Yes, we praise him for that. And there is nothing more any man could say about this greater than what Scripture says in Ephesians 1:3-14. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself according to the kind intention of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, which he freely bestowed on us in the beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace which he lavished on us. In all wisdom and insight, he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his kind intention, which he purposed in him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times. That is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens, and things on the earth. In him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to his purpose, who works all things after the counsel of his will. To the end that we who were first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of his glory. In Him you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having also believed. Get this. You were sealed in him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of his glory. Amen.

I hope I've established the fact that only God is only wise, and that God has displayed his wisdom in creation, with the culmination of his wisdom being revealed in redemption through the work of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
And for our last point, we need to examine the questions around 'communicability'. I think I made that word up. I'm going to be honest with you...'communicability'. I like it. Sounds good. You like it? Communicability. You feel free to use it. Um. That as his creatures made in his image we can receive wisdom, have wisdom, and walk in wisdom. So first let me address how do we know that wisdom is a communicable attribute? Well, I'll tell you how. This little tune says because the Bible tells me so. That's how you know. Proverbs 2:6 says, for the Lord gives wisdom. From his mouth come knowledge and discernment. Proverbs 8:17, wisdom says, I love those who love me, and those who diligently seek me will find me. James 1:5 so clearly tells us, but if any of you lacks wisdom, if any...how many in here lack wisdom? Raise your hand...by a show of hands. Matthew, you need to get your hand up. Thank you. I work with him. I know he needs some wisdom, as do I. If any of you lacks wisdom, every hand went up. Let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. We just need to ask God, and he'll give it to us generously and without reproach. But my question for you and for me, as I was thinking, is how many of us who profess Christ as Lord are guilty of failing to petition the throne of grace with boldness, even asking for an ounce of wisdom? We go into our days as if we've got it under control, and we don't need any of God's wisdom, and we think we have all the wisdom we need, don't we? Well, how do we get wisdom? We've seen it is communicable. How do we get it?
Well, I'm here to tell you wisdom has a starting point, and it has a nice, some nice measuring sticks related to our attitude and our actions. So the starting point is this. The fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord is the starting point for getting wisdom. Now, what does that mean? Well, the basic root word for fear in Hebrew has three different meanings. It means to be in dread or terror. Okay. It means to stand in awe. And it means to revere and to respect. See, Proverbs 1:7 says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. Proverbs 9:10 says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. Proverbs 15:33 says, the fear of the Lord is the instruction for wisdom, and before honor comes humility. See, that's our starting point. Because when we fear the Lord, we are in a reverential awe and wonder of the Lord. It creates a healthy tension in us of both shrinking back in fear and drawing close in awe and adoration. Uh, my favorite verse to look at these meanings all together is Exodus 20:20. Now set the stage...so God has come down to the mountain. Moses has gone up to the mountain to get the Ten Commandments. That's where we're at. And the people are coming. They're down at the bottom of the mountain. The mountain is shaking. There is smoke. There are horns blowing. There is fire. There is thunder. There is. There is everything you would expect to be scared to death. And the people are like Moses. We don't. We don't want to see God or talk to God. You come tell us. And Moses comes down and says this to the people. He says, Exodus 20:20, Moses said to the people, do not be afraid, dread or terror, for God has come in order to test you, and in order that the fear, awe reverence and respect of him may remain with you. Why? So that you may not sin, so that you may not sin. John MacArthur is very helpful in his study Bible, where he writes this. The fear of the Lord is a state of mind in which one's own attitudes, will, feelings, deeds and goals are exchanged for Gods. You get that? The fear of the Lord, the fear of the Lord is a state of mind in which one's own attitudes, will, feelings, deeds and goals are exchanged for Gods. When I read that, I'm saying, well, in other words, repentance. The word repentance, metanoia is a change of mind. To be in agreement with God about your sin, to forsake sin. That's what it's talking about. The fear of the Lord is required for that. So my question is, do you have...do I have a reverential respect and awe and fear of a holy, triune God? See, the fear of the Lord is how we have the attitude of humility. You need to understand humility is required to get wisdom and godly wisdom results in more humility. Because a wise man or woman walking in humility realizes the truth of Proverbs 9:10. That is the fear of the Lord. That's the beginning of understanding. Get it?...that reverential awe and respect and a healthy fear of a holy God is what causes us to die to ourselves and come to him in humility. That true wisdom, godly wisdom, is only found in God through Christ by the Holy Spirit, who is our helper, our teacher, and our counselor.
Thirdly, how do you know if you're walking in wisdom? Well, I think you can look at two areas in your life. I think you can look at your attitude, and I think you can look at your actions, your attitude and your actions. You want some little check off and you know, the Bible says, test yourself. See, we have the faith. Here we go. Proverbs 3:7 says, do not be wise in your own eyes....attitude. Fear the Lord and turn away from evil...action. Proverbs 11:2 says, when pride comes then comes dishonor. But with the humble is wisdom...attitude. Let's get practical as it relates to action. Where do we go for wisdom? The first place we go is the Bible. We have the revealed Word of God given to us. And Proverbs is full of wisdom....the entire book. It was written and given for wisdom. Proverbs 1:2-5, Solomon says, here's why it's written...to know wisdom and instruction, to discern the sayings of understanding, to receive instruction and wise behavior, righteousness, justice, and equity. To give prudence to the naive. To the youth knowledge and discretion. A wise man will hear and increase in learning, and a man of understanding will acquire sound wisdom or wise counsel. I just would submit and some of you have heard of this....decades ago heard the proverb of the day. There's 31 chapters in the book of Proverbs. 31 days in a lot of the months just read whatever date it is, read that proverb. And don't worry if you miss some dates, just pick it up at the next date. They're standalone chapters and just keep doing it year after year after year after year, month after month, week after week, day after day. I promise you it will bless you. Secondly, Proverbs clearly establishes as it right there will acquire wise counsel. Proverbs clearly established that wisdom is found in a multitude of counselors. So get wise counsel from wise, godly people. Proverbs 13:6-10 says through insolence, I looked it up....that's rude and disrespectful behavior, comes nothing but strife. But wisdom is with those who receive counsel. Proverbs 18:1-2 speak to wrong attitude and actions. 18:1-2 say this,, he who separates himself seeks his own desire. He quarrels against all sound wisdom, and a fool does not delight in understanding, but in only revealing his own mind. You speak to somebody that don't want to listen what you have to say. They want to tell you what they think about everything. Proverbs 12:1 which I have to say and he's given me permission in the past.  This was my baby Owen. This is like his life verse for years. Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge. But he who hates reproof is stupid. I had to take him to the scriptures to show him how he was living, why he was making these decisions, why I had to keep spanking him. The antonym to wisdom. When you look it up is stupidity or folly. So whoever loves discipline loves knowledge. But he who hates reproof is stupid. They're the opposite of wise. Proverbs 12:15 says, the way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man is he who listens to counsel. In Proverbs 18:12, before destruction, the heart of man is haughty, but humility goes before honor. Are you seeing a theme here? The attitude of humility versus an attitude of pride. It's always interesting to me to see this take place in a counseling setting. Over the years, Kelly and I have counseled people in the midst of a lot of conflict, a lot of issues. And then yet when we counsel from the Bible and wisdom is given from the Bible, they want to argue or disagree as if we're the ones sitting where they're sitting and they're sitting where we're sitting. They want to pretend they're walking in wisdom. And it's really a display of some, some attitude and action issues that I've been referring to. And it's shown so clearly in James. James 3:13-18, who among you is wise and understanding? Let him show by his good behavior his deeds in the gentleness of wisdom. There you've got action and you've got attitude. But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural, demonic. For where jealousy and selfish ambition exists, there is disorder and every evil thing. But the wisdom from above is first pure. It's peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering and without hypocrisy. And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. It's real easy in a counseling session to see where somebody stands. Is it, uh, good behavior and gentleness of wisdom or selfish ambition and bitter jealousy and all these things that it talks about, these disorders. You see, the possession of knowledge without wisdom simply leads to an arrogant and unrepentant heart. 1 Corinthians 8:1 says, knowledge makes arrogant. And here's where I like the old King Jimmy. Knowledge puffeth up. I like that word puffeth. That's exciting to me to say that. See, there's a way that seems right to a man. But therein lies death. Because those that reject Christ reject his wisdom and are fools, though they themselves don't even see it. 1 Corinthians 1:18 and then 22 through 24 and 30 and 31 say this, for the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. For indeed Jews ask for signs in Greek search for wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness. But to those who are called both Jews and Greeks. Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. But by his doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. So that just as it is written, let him who boasts, boast in the Lord. Not in yourself. Self, self, self is the fruit of pride. And self, self, self is the main fruit and root we see when we counsel.
In closing, here's some takeaways. God is wisdom and God has revealed his wisdom to all mankind in creation. Therefore, no man or woman is without excuse. And that God has revealed himself in the person and work of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of God's nature, and who upholds all things by the word of his power, Hebrews 1:3. And because of this act of wisdom, the mystery of ages past is revealed. The veil was torn in two. And salvation is available to all who will call on the name of the Lord, and you will be saved. And lastly, God makes his wisdom available to those of us who are in Christ. So the question for all of us this morning is, what will you do with this information? Here's what I've been mulling through. What am I going to do with this information? So for your consideration, I'll leave you with this.
See, because wisdom has a call. Wisdom has a warning, and unbelief has consequences. Proverbs one...here's your call. Wisdom shouts in the street. She lifts her voice in the square at the head of the noisy streets. She cries out. At the entrance of the gates in the city she utters her sayings. How long, oh, naive ones will you love being simple minded and scoffers delight themselves in scoffing and fools hate knowledge. Turn to my reproof. There's your call. Behold, I will pour out my spirit on you. And I will make my words known to you. That's the call.
Now here's the warning and the consequences. And these next two sections to me are some of the scariest in Scripture. Continuing in Proverbs one, because I called and you refused. I stretched out my hand and no one paid attention, and you neglected all my counsel and did not want my reproof. I will also laugh at your calamity. I will mock when your dread comes. When your dread comes like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind. When distress and anguish come upon you then they will call on me, but I will not answer. Then they will seek me diligently, but they will not find me. Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. They would not accept my counsel. They spurned all my reproof. So they shall eat of the fruit of their own way, and be satiated with their own devices. For the waywardness of the naive will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them. Romans 1:18 through 32. It's a long, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them. For God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. We've talked about that. For even though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks. But they came became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man, and of birds, and forfeited animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lust of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason, God gave them over to degrading passions, for their women, exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural. In the same way also, men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another. Men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error, and just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind to do those things which are not proper, being filled with unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful. And although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death. They not only do the same, but they give hearty approval to those who practice them. We see it in our world all the time. Hearty approval to all these wicked things that we just read out where God has said. I will give them over to that. There's your call. There's your warning and there's your consequence. And what a fearful place to be.
But the good news of the gospel this morning is you don't have to be in that place. For anyone here with an unrepentant heart, whether it be the unconverted heart of an unbeliever or the hardened heart of a believer. Wisdom calls out. The Holy Spirit, calls out through the preaching of the word this morning, for you to apply wisdom, to have a reverential fear of the Lord, to humble yourself and repent so that you can have peace with God through his redemptive work. The work of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Let me pray. Father, we thank you for your Word. We thank you for your truths. We thank you, Lord, for the wisdom that you give to us. And Lord, I pray that every one of us would leave here this morning in awe of the fact that you are wisdom. Lord, as much as our puny brains can't even comprehend that truth to the degree that it is true. Lord, I pray that you would give us discernment. Lord, I pray that we would leave here and know you more. Lord, I pray for every person here that does not know you. Lord, as your wisdom calls for your redemptive work on the cross, Lord Jesus, that you would save their souls for your glory. Lord, I pray for those sitting here that belong to you, Lord, that over time leaven has entered and they have hardened their heart, and they have turned, and they have quenched your spirit, Lord, so often...that this message would prick their heart and would cause them to repent, to confess, to forsake, and come back to a loving Father. All this I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.

 

The Mercy of God

Chris Peterson

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The Mercy of God

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Good morning. It's a pleasure to be here this morning and bring God's Word to you. My name is Chris Peterson, and I have the privilege of serving as one of the elders here. And when I preached a year ago, you may remember, the first thing I did was mention that I was wearing my kids, my boys clothes. Well. Hasn't changed. I'm still wearing the three of them different articles. But I also mentioned that I had eight children, and I had almost three grandchildren. That was a year ago. So Ruby Rose is close to a year old now. And now something's changed. I get to say I have almost four grandchildren. So my coat...not mine, but the coat and the tie are from my son Judah in honor of him and Jaden giving us our fourth grandchild. So. I can't see Jaden, but I'm sure she's turning red. Right? There she is. Yeah, yeah. Um, Jude is just cool as a cucumber, so I'm not worried about him. But just, you know, just hearing the song, His Mercy is More. And just praying and meditating on God's word regarding mercy, it really just reminds me how unworthy I am to stand up here and preach his Word. But it also reminds me that I know something about his mercy, because I have been a recipient of his mercy time and time again. Um, from the day that he saved me out of darkness, uh, and continues. So I have the privilege of preaching on the attribute of mercy, this morning. You know, Adam mentioned last week that we're preaching on the attributes of God this summer. Uh, and so, um, having the privilege of preaching on mercy, we'll be using Ephesians 2:4-7. But if you go back to the first three verses of Ephesians two, uh, they illustrate the depth of depravity and sin to which we were all a part of, as well as the lifeless state and wrath that we deserved. It speaks of indulging the desires of the flesh, the mind, and that we were by nature children of wrath. These three verses paint the bleakest picture of our true condition apart from Christ, making the word 'rich' that we'll see here in verse four where we'll pick up, um, point to God's merciful ability to make even the most vilest sinner clean. And if we even go to the beginning of Ephesians in chapter one, Paul says, according to the riches of his grace which he lavished upon us. I love that word lavish because it's just the it's even hard to to put into words, but it's just a, a ridiculous amount of, of his grace being lavished upon us. Um, and no one is beyond the reach of his mercy. So if you'll please turn in your Bibles to Ephesians two and follow as I read verses four through seven.
"But God, being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us. Even when we were dead in our transgressions, he made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved and raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus."
Pray with me. Father, thank you for everyone here this morning. And Lord, I pray that you would open all of our hearts to hear the truth of Your Word. Help us to see you as the merciful, gracious, compassionate God that you are. Thank you, Lord, for your mercy and love for us, your adopted children. In Christ's name, Amen.
So the main idea we have here this morning is that God's mercy flows from his great love for sinners...that's you and me, resulting in salvation. I'll say that again. God's mercy flows from his great love for sinners, resulting in our salvation. A good definition of mercy from one Bible dictionary is God's compassion to the miserable, or set in a different way. God's mercy targets man's sinful misery. I knew someone who was addicted to alcohol and following a horrible tragedy in their life, a desire to drink themselves even to the point of death. But God. But God, as it says in our passage today, who is rich in mercy targeted his misery and had multiple believers witness to him, begging him on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God. Well, Christ saved this person who was indeed dead in their transgressions and almost physically dead. Today, that person is growing in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ and is walking in the truth. That's a picture of our text today. As in our definition above, God's mercy targets man's sinful misery. Well, as we saw last week, God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So we should expect to see the story of his mercy in the same Biblical past, our present salvation, and God's future grace.
So the first point this morning, in light of the Biblical past tense, is that God's mercy is a rich mark of his love throughout Biblical history. So in verse four, the first part of verse four, it says again, but God being rich in mercy. Sinclair Ferguson says the phrase, But God, is reminiscent of the turning points of the personal or corporate laments in the Psalms. Psalm 41 is an example. David is surrounded by the malice of enemies and experiences the betrayal of a close friend. And as he focuses on his situation, the outlook is bleak and he can see no way out. Then he looks up to the throne of heaven. By faith, he sees God Himself seated on it and cries out, but you, O Lord! He began to realize that if God is for him, nothing ultimately can be against him. And that's Psalm 41. So now we'll look at three examples in the Old Testament when God's mercy is revealed in his actions, providing proof of the richness of that mercy. In each example, there was misery on the part of man, and God intervened and poured out his mercy. The first example is God and Moses. And in Exodus 34:6 we read that, and the Lord passed by before him and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long suffering and obedient in goodness and truth. Here we see God's boundless mercy, patience, and faithfulness, as well as the fact that he is not simply lenient, but actively shows favor and forgiveness, even to those who have greatly offended him. The word compassion in the NASB and mercy in the ESV are the same word in Hebrew. The first attribute mentioned by God in this encounter is his mercy, aimed at those miserable Israelites in the wilderness after pursuing false idol worship of the Golden Calf. It also came after much grumbling and complaining by them giving further proof of their misery. So, continuing to work from our definition of mercy above, God's mercy targets man's sinful misery. I want you to think of a command missile guidance system which relies on external commands to steer the missile. Upon receiving the command, the missile's guidance system becomes active. The system, acting as the missile's brains, utilizes various technologies to determine the missile's current location and trajectory relative to the target's position. God's mercy is the missile. And your sinful misery is the target. It will find its mark. One commentator writes. At an earlier period, God has announced himself to Moses in the glory of his self-existent and eternal majesty as I am. Now, he makes himself known as the glory of his grace and goodness. Being about to republish his law, the sin of the Israelites being forgiven, and the deed of pardon about to be signed and sealed by reviewing the terms of the former covenant. It was the most fitting time to proclaim the extent of the Divine Mercy, which was to be displayed not in the case of Israel only, but of all who offend. Our second Old Testament example of God's mercy is God and David. And in Samuel 24, we read, so the prophet Gad came to David and told him, shall seven years of famine come to you in your land? Or will you flee three months before your foes while they pursue you? Or shall there be three days pestilence in your land? Now consider and see what answer I shall return to him who sent me. Then David said to Gad, I am in great distress. Let us now fall into the hands of the Lord, for his mercies are great. Do not let me fall into the hand of man. So when David acted in pride to number the people at the beginning of chapter 24, he knew he was wrong, because in verse ten he says, it says. Now David's heart troubled him after he had numbered the people. So David said to the Lord, I have sinned greatly in what I have done. But now, O Lord, please take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have acted very foolishly. Numbering the people was not inherently sinful. Moses had done it under God's command. However, David acted without God's command or his divine sanction. And so David was motivated by pride, vanity, self-confidence, and distrust of God. Being incited by the Lord's anger against Israel. But David knew that God was far more merciful than his enemies. So he chose to fall into the hand of the Lord rather than man. In Psalm 86:15 he says, but you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in loving kindness and truth. It's hard not to mention Psalm 51 when talking of David and his sinful misery. After sinning with Bathsheba and being confronted by Nathan, David writes, be gracious to me, O God, according to your loving kindness. According to the greatness of your compassion, blot out my transgressions. Remember that we said, compassion and mercy are the same word in Hebrew. He goes on to write. For I know my transgressions. And they are always before me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of your salvation. While he is in such misery that he can't go anywhere without it being before him. What a great picture of misery! Our last example of proof is found in Jonah 4:2. When my oldest daughter, Savannah, was about 4 or 5, she asked us every day to read Jonah to her. We didn't get very far, but we started, you know, and went a little ways, but it was every single day. And, it will be forever... that's one verse that I don't have to read because it's burned in my brain. And it says the word of the Lord came to toJonah, son of...well, I do have to read it, I guess. The word of the Lord. It's been a few years. She's 28 so the word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, arise, go to Nineveh, the great city, and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before me. I mentioned it for two reasons. The first one is because it is stuck in my head, and the second is because Jonah is disobedient and goes in the opposite direction. We all know that the Lord sent his missile of mercy and delivered him from the inside of the belly of a giant fish. So as we look at God and Jonah, we go to Jonah 4:2 where he says he prayed to the Lord and said, please, Lord, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore, in order to forestall this, I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness, and one who relents concerning calamity. Jonah clearly knew and understood the gracious character of God. He had personally received mercy, as mentioned above, but he didn't want Nineveh to know that same mercy. Can you think of a time when you have received mercy in your sin, but when it happens to others, it bothers you? It also makes me think of the prodigal son in Luke 15, where the younger son received mercy from the father, but the older son was angry and bitter about it, and jealous even. But as we mentioned earlier, compassion and mercy are closely intertwined. In the Old Testament, mercy is often displayed as an expression of God's compassionate nature. It was manifested in the areas of leniency, forgiveness, and grace, even when the people and nations were disobedient. As we have observed in our three examples.
So the second point this morning is in light of the present tense of our salvation journey. God's mercy...point number two is God's mercy is representative of his ongoing love to sinners in the gospel. We see that in verses four through six...because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved and raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Amen. Amen. Vickie. Thank you. John Bunyan says Jesus Christ would have mercy offered to the biggest sinners, because by their forgiveness and salvation, others hearing of it will be encouraged the more to come to him for mercy. Well Paul describes how our present salvation is proof of God's ongoing, merciful love, and that he still targets our misery caused by our own sinfulness. The best way for me to illustrate this is to share how God saved a miserable, wretched sinner like me. Romans 3:23 says, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. That includes you, and that includes me. Well, I grew up in a Christian home where my parents had us in church every Sunday. It really felt like they made us go. I don't remember ever being asked if I wanted to go. I was just there. So the way I see it is, we were made to go. When I was seven, I went down front at the end of the service because my older brother did. I didn't know why he was going. I just knew that I didn't want to be left there sitting by myself. My brother was three years older than me, and I idolized him, and I did pretty much whatever he did. So, it turns out that I was going down for an altar call. And so I did, and I went through the motions, and I was baptized shortly after that. But there was no spiritual fruit in my life. I attended that church until I graduated from high school and didn't step back into a church until I got married at 26. It was that same church, by the way. But a few years had passed, and I continued to live a worldly lifestyle by pursuing my own desires and had no desire for the things of the Lord. But after several years of marriage, my wife turned to the Lord, and I began to see a change in her. She had a joy and a peace that I hadn't seen in her, and I certainly didn't have myself. She started attending a Bible study that some of her friends were attending. And she asked me if I would go with her. Well, I didn't have any intention or desire to change my lifestyle. And that's really the first thing that popped into my mind. I didn't say it, but I had no intention of changing. I was going to go and I would support her in this new thing that she was in. That was my attitude. Well, I had always thought Bible studies were for weird Christians, not normal ones like me. And one thing I left out was during this whole time I thought I was a Christian. My dad even told me, well, you went down at seven, you got baptized. You're a Christian. And as I begin to understand what it really meant to be a Christian, I knew that that wasn't true. I had the head knowledge and believed in God, but I had no idea that I needed to repent and turn to him and confess him as Savior and Lord. So I went, and I not only heard the truth about Christ, but I saw it in the lives of the couple that were leading the Bible study. Many of you know them. It was Phil and Martha Mullins who were one of the couples that started this church. And they showed us love and grace and kindness and tenderness. Even though we were, we were stupid. I mean, we were ignorant, but they were gentle with us. And I began to see what a true believer looked like and acted like. And  Christ's love and truth that I heard from them began to penetrate my heart. I turned to Christ in repentance and faith. And even when I was dead in my transgressions, he made me alive together with Christ. By grace I was saved. I know I didn't deserve his forgiveness, but I also knew and know now that I have been crucified with Christ. And it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. His great mercy for me flowed from his great love, which resulted in my salvation. I was 30 years old when I came to Christ, but shortly after that I remember. I mean, it was just like a few weeks later. I remember driving home from work one day, and I decided to stop by the store and buy a six pack, and I had actually done this for many years. So it was it was really more out of habit than anything else. I remember thinking...so it did not have the same appeal, but really it was more out of habit. That's why I stopped. But it didn't have the same appeal. And I remember thinking why that was. And a verse came to mind and I was a new believer. So I had like zero verses memorized and I didn't even ever remember committing this verse to memory. But the verse was 1 Corinthians 5:17. And it said, therefore, if any man is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things passed away, and behold, new things have come. And then it made sense. That was an aha moment for me, because it made it clear to me why I no longer had the same desire. I wasn't the same person. I was a new creation. So to the unbeliever here this morning, the one who has never trusted in Christ for their salvation. Are you tired of living in misery?...No hope, no light at the end of the tunnel, lonely? But God demonstrates his own love for us in this. That while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. God has proven that his mercy is rich. As we saw in the Old Testament that he sent His Son to die on your behalf even when you didn't or don't now, at this moment, deserve it, because you are dead in your transgressions. Recalling who I was before Christ is hard, because I was in opposition to our Lord Jesus Christ, and now know that he relentlessly pursued me and missile locked in on my own misery. He bled and died the most horrific death. Why did he do that? And why for me? Because of his great love, as it says here in Ephesians. Because of his great love with which he loved us. That's why. And this is the result in Isaiah 1:18 it says, come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool. What a beautiful picture of us being dead and then being alive, being dirty and being clean by his blood. Turn to Christ today by repenting of your sins and believing on his name. Romans 10:9-10 says, if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. Well, have you ever heard someone say, if he saved me, he can save you? Listen to what Paul says in first Timothy. He says it is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all. Yet for this reason, I found mercy so that in me, as the foremost Jesus Christ might demonstrate his perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in him for eternal life. In essence, that's what Paul is saying here, and that's what I'm saying to you. I was the chief of sinners. Yet for this reason I found mercy. No matter how bad or lost you think you are...His mercy is greater. Remember the example at the beginning that I gave of a person who was almost physically dead? Well, God's mercy saved him when many people thought that person was beyond saving. They underestimated God's mercy. And so if you think you are beyond saving, God's mercy is still presently saving people today. And that person would tell you the same thing. They would tell you that you are not beyond saving because that person is walking with Christ today. And also, God's mercies are still new each day. Lamentations 3:22-23 say the Lord's loving kindnesses indeed never cease, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. Here we see the present tense, even though this was written in the Old Testament. His mercies are new for you every morning. His compassions for you never fail. Charles Spurgeon said, God loved us even when we were dead in sins. His love does not depend on what we are. It flows from his own heart. It is not love of something good in us. It is love of us because of everything good in him. Here you see the greatness of his grace in that he loved us even when we were dead in sins. He loved me even when I was dead in my sins. His mercy is present. And if you are not in Christ this morning, know that his mercy is even now, at this moment, even under the sound of my voice, his mercy is targeting your misery.
So the last point today is, in light of God's future grace toward us is that God's mercy is redemptive work of his gracious love for all eternity to praise. We see that in verse seven, so that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. God's grace is not just a present day blessing, but will continue to be revealed in ages to come. Here we see the exceeding riches of God's grace, demonstrating the greatness of God's love and kindness toward humanity through Jesus Christ. Romans 2:4 says, or do you think lightly of the riches of his kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance. Our hope points to our future as believers, where we will be praising God's glorious grace for all eternity. 1 Timothy 1:17 says, now to the King, eternal, immortal, invisible, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. That's what we'll be saying in our in our praises to him. Last week, my family had the privilege of going to the beach. I mention this because standing on the beach or looking out from our balcony or deck, or some people call it a crow's nest. It is difficult to see where the ocean ends and the sky meets. It's always amazed me. This makes me think of our future in light of eternity and also the one who created it all...the King, Eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God. So now we've looked at God's mercy as a rich mark of his love in light of the past. And we've looked at his mercy as representative of his ongoing love to sinners in the gospel, in the present, and ending with his mercy as the redemptive work of his gracious love for all eternity to praise in the future. So now, how can we receive more of God's mercy. For the unbeliever there is only one way. You cry out for it. Two men went into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself. God, I thank you that I am not like other people...Swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I pay tithes, tithes of all that I get. But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven. But beating his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. Cry out to him and pray as the tax collector did. God be merciful to me, the sinner. Who can receive mercy? The humble man who cries out to God for his mercy. Who is it hard for to receive mercy or who can't receive mercy? The self-righteous man who focuses on one's own merits rather than seeking God's mercy. Hear the words of the prophet Micah, Who is God like you, who pardons iniquity and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of his possession. He does not retain his anger forever because he delights in unchanging love. He will again have compassion on us. He will tread our iniquities under foot. Again, I will say to the unbeliever, there is only one way to receive God's mercy. You must cry out for it.
For the believer here today. How can we receive more of God's mercy? Well, I'll give you three ways. The first one is that we can seek more of it. Matthew 5:7 says, blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. How are you showing mercy to others? One way to seek more is to extend more, which in essence is what Matthew 5:7 is saying. Remember, mercy is given when it is undeserved. So it is not easy for us. And I sayus who tend towards pride and self righteousness...show compassion, forgiveness even when it is undeserved, and kindness to those who are in misery. Just as you have received mercy yourself from God. The second way is that we can praise God for it. 1 Peter 2:9-10 says, but you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. For you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God. You had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. When was the last time you praised God for his great mercy to you in salvation, and proclaimed his excellencies to others? He is worthy of all of our praise. And 1 Peter 1 says so that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in the praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. So the third way that we can receive more of God's mercy is that we can show it to others. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. John MacArthur says, "the best illustration of showing mercy is the Lord himself. Jesus Christ was the most merciful human being who ever lived. He reached out to heal the sick, restore the crippled, give sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and even life to the dead. He found prostitutes, tax collectors, the debauched and the drunken and drew them into a circle of love and forgiveness. When the scribes and Pharisees brought the adulteress to him to see if he would agree to her stoning, he confronted them with their merciless hypocrisy. He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her. When no one stepped forward to condemn her, Jesus said to her, neither do I condemn you. Go your way. From now on, sin no more. In John 8:7-11, we see that Jesus wept with the sorrowing and gave compassion to the lonely. He took little children into his arms and blessed them. He was merciful to everyone. He was mercy incarnate, just as he was love incarnate."
So today we have seen that God's mercy flows from his great love for sinners, resulting in salvation. We did this by looking at God's mercy as a rich mark of his love throughout Biblical history, and as a representative of his ongoing love to sinners in the gospel and finally as a redemptive work of his gracious love for all eternity to praise. So to close, we looked at ways that we can receive more mercy. For the unbeliever, it was to cry out as the tax collector, and for the believer it was to seek more of it, and to praise God for it and show it to others. So I hope that you will leave here this morning with a deeper understanding of God's attribute of mercy, and how he targets our misery for his glory. If you would like to hear more about God's rich mercy, or if you would like to be prayed for, the elders will be available down front after the service. So, in closing, I want to close with words from a hymn written, a long time ago in 1700s by Charles Wesley. And I think it sums up what I was trying to say perfectly. The title of the hymn is Depth of Mercy.

"Depth of mercy can there be mercy still reserved for me? Can my God his wrath forbear? Me, the chief of sinners spare? I have long withstood his grace, long provoked him to his face. Would not hearken to his calls. Grieved him by a thousand falls. I, my master, have denied. I afresh have crucified. Oft profaned his hallowed name. Put him to an open shame. There for me, the Saviour stands, shows his wounds and spreads his hands. God is love. I know I feel. Jesus weeps but loves me still. Now incline to me repent. Let me now my fall lament. Now my foul revolt deplore. Believe and sin no more."
Let's pray. Father, thank you for showing us your mercy by sending us your Son. Lord, who even though he knew no sin, became sin on our behalf, so that we might become your righteousness. Thank you, Lord, for teaching us from your perfect Word this morning. Help us to show mercy to others as you have shown us mercy. Guide us in your truth this week, Lord, by your spirit. Father, we ask that you continue to draw us to yourself. Lord, we are blown away by the fact that you show us mercy...undeserved, unmerited. Lord, and everyone here who has trusted in you for salvation knows that...has experienced that, Lord. But the good news is, Lord, that you have given us victory in Christ. And so may we be encouraged, Lord, by that. Thank you, Lord, for your steadfast love for us. And it is in Christ's matchless name that we pray. Amen.

 

The Eternality of God

Pastor Adam Ashoff

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God Is Eternal

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Well, please turn in your Bibles to Psalm 8. It's time to play ball. I love the Psalms. We're not in a series in the Psalms this summer; we're doing a series on the attributes of God. But, in Psalm 8, it's my summer jam. Psalms are songs. Psalm 1 is my favorite. Psalm 103 is my favorite gospel Psalm. Psalm 119 is my favorite Bible Psalm. But Psalm 8 is my summer Psalm. It's a fitting psalm to read, maybe on the East coast if you get up early to watch the sunrise, if you're on the West coast, to watch a sunset or just here in Hickory looking up at the stars. Why, I want to start in Psalm 8 and we'll go a bunch of other places is Psalm 8 is about, as it is couched in praise, pure praise directed to God in verse 1 and verse 9. It's about what we want this summer series on the attributes of God to be, about knowing God and praising God. That is the high point for us as his creation. It's to know him. It's to know who he is. And then in knowing who he is and what he has done to give him the praise and honor and glory due his name, as we just did in the doxology. That's what our lives...at their greatest expression lead up to is to praising God, for he alone is worthy of all praise. And so this summer in this series, we want to look at God in all of his Godness to know him more and to praise him. Our theology will always feed and precede our doxology. Our theology is our study of God, our knowledge of God. Our doxology is our worship and praise to him in theology. What you know about him is what feeds that doxology. Psalm 8 pictures King David, the warrior poet of Israel, strumming his gittith. If it means harp, it could. It might not. And he looks at the heavens above, and he is moved to worship the magnificence of God. His physical eyes looked up at creation, and that prompted his spiritual eyes to cry out in praise. And that's what I pray this series on the attributes of God will do. Looking at a different attribute of God each week this summer for the next ten weeks, maybe, something like that into August. That we as one congregation would marry such rich theology that are in front of us in the scriptures, with wonderful doxology. Not just that we would express each time we would come with one voice to gather and sing to God the praises due his name. But our lives would be doxologies. We would leave as we would go out from here, that our lives would be lives full of praise, not just heads full of knowledge, but that knowledge would make the long distance between the head and the heart. And then from the heart we would live out hands and feet, loving those around us, serving those around us, and pointing back to the great God with whom we know. So let's look at the eternality of God. First attribute we're going to look at this summer and Psalm 8 being our starting point for that.
"O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth who have displayed your splendor above the heavens. From the mouth of infants and nursing babes, you have established strength because of your adversaries to make the enemy and the revengeful cease. When I consider your heavens the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have ordained. What is man that you take thought of him, and the Son of man that you care for him. Yet you have made him a little lower than God, and you crown him with glory and majesty. You make him to rule over the works of your hands. You have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes through the paths of the seas. O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.”
Father, great are your works. Studied by all who delight in you. So help us we ask to see who you are in all of your glorious works throughout your scriptures today. For us to delight in them. Nothing less than delight...certainly more. We pray there would be duty that would follow from this obedience service to you. But may the starting point be our joy in you. Amen.
So let's start this series thinking about the eternality of God. Start by trying to empty your mind. Think about nothing which some of you have a greater advantage than others in this department. Way ahead of you, pastor...blank slate. Now that you're awake and offended. Just try to have a starting point this morning, as we again venture into the series on the attributes of God, of knowing nothing about God. You hear the word God and nothing comes into your mind except this. That you are thinking, hopefully by this point, maybe just the letters G, O, D are in your mind, but you are thinking and that's the starting point in this endeavor...your mind, your ability to think about anything or anyone, let alone a god, is a first step in the argument for knowing God. What do I mean by that? Well, there's a philosophical argument. It's very deep. It goes back to third grade. You often used it. You would say to someone else, it takes one to know one. Sally runs up to you, says you are a smelly dog. And you said in response, it takes one to know one. It's deep stuff, isn't it? But you can start with that idea. And again, your ability to think right now, use your intelligence rational thought to take out...it takes one to know one and put in...it takes a mind to know a mind. It takes rational thought to even fathom rational thought. He's just sitting there thinking. I am thinking I don't know anything else, I don't have whatever on me to. Well, here we are in 2025 where half of you have on your phones. It's telling you your heartbeat. It's telling you your brainwaves, how much sleep you got. It's telling you everything. Your blood pressure. It's telling you what you should eat for lunch. So I was going to say the only thing you might know about yourself right now is that you're thinking. But some of you who live now are slaves to your things on your wrist to tell you everything about yourself as if you didn't exist for the past 48 years without this. And you were doing fine. But now you need to know how's my oxygen rate? Oh, it says it's dipped. I need to take a deep breath. Thank you. Phone. And then you're selling this to other people. Hey, man, you really need to know your oxygen rate, because Adam's going to get long winded and you need to breathe. Takes a mind to know a mind. That actually does go back in Western thought to Greek philosophers like Socrates and his students, Plato, Aristotle, who by power of their thinking, rational thinking, reasoned their way not necessarily to God, but what we'll abbreviate today the GCB, the greatest conceivable being. That was what, nice job, right? They sat around and did some of you love that idea. Can I get paid to sit around and try to fathom the unfathomable, the great conceivable being. But why they did this is they were looking for something beyond the physical world. And in Plato's treatise, the realm of forms, the form of the good, he searched beyond what we could see in the physical world to a source of all knowledge that gave meaning and value to truth, beauty, and goodness. When those philosophers would look around in the world and they would say, where? Where do we have this idea of truth? Where does it come from?...and goodness, morality...where does it come from. And beauty aesthetic...where does it come from? That's what they tried to reason their way with their mind alone. No text of Scripture in their hands. When you go back 500 years from Plato to David in Psalm 8, he didn't need to be one of the world's greatest philosophers. He didn't need any scientific arguments to stare at the sky, to look at the stars above, he says, and ask a question about his own existence. Why am I here? Because we think we need. I mean, it is true. Like, you give some people facts and they suddenly, oh, wow. Now that I realize that that's, you know, facts about how big the universe is, as I was reading this week with coffee cup in hand again. How big is our solar system and then galaxy and something like if we're in the Milky Way. If my coffee mug, which is always at hand in my study and if our galaxy, the Milky Way was my coffee mug, something like a grain of sugar in that would be the earth. And then that coffee mug is inside of the universe, the size of North America. Something like that. And I. Oh, wow. That's amazing. So now I can praise God, I can. I got coffee so I can praise him. And I got my Bible and I can praise him. And now I have this great thought of the majesty. But look, um, you trying to fathom light years. And the difference between whether the universe is continually expanding is trillions and trillions of light years or billions. Like, just be honest with yourself. You don't know the difference. There's one guy in here that might when it just comes to the math of it. And David didn't need all of that. He didn't need philosophy from Socrates and Plato and Aristotle in verse 4 to just contemplate the greatness of God. He simply used the mind God gave him. And he stared out into the sky. He stopped and he meditated on the greatness of God, and it brought him back to his own finitude. So what is man that you think of me? I mean, that's really the starting point, I hope, for the series this Summer of the Attributes of God. You say, why would we want to do this series? What's so great about it? Well, get lost as Spurgeon would say, get lost in the majesty of God. Go swim in an ocean of his attributes if you need to solve some of your woes. Because what that does, according to Calvin, it gives you the two most important pieces of wisdom you can get in the institutes he wrote...a true knowledge of God and a true knowledge of yourself. And if you can marry those things together, you'll be all right. Now. Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Do I need to study the attributes of God to know myself better, or do I need to know myself better in order then to see God rightly? The answer is yes. But if you really need a starting point, it is the attributes of God. It is knowing God. Because what we'll see today in his Eternality does as Psalm 8 starts us down this path. Reverses on us this question of who are we in light of this amazing God who is unlike me. And there might not be a way He is more unlike you and I than in his eternality.
So I'm about to give you the most complex outline in my six years here. It's three points and here they are in case you didn't get the handout. Point one. God. Point two Is point three Eternal. Y'all ready for that? Subject. Verb. Object. Really complex stuff today. God is eternal, and I want to go in that order. Because if we're going to study the attributes of God this summer and each other teacher that's going to come up here is going to change that last description, that last attribute. But I want to back it up to just the start with God, so nobody else has to do that. Is...whatis is? We'll get to that. Please know it's the look I get from Shannon. On long road trips, I'm like, what are you thinking about? She's like our kids. Like, where are we going? You know, I'm just humming and I'm like, but what is is. And no, she wouldn't do that to me. So some of you are going to really be excited to talk about what is is the rest of you are normal.

So let's start point one...God. Let's start by thinking about the idea of God. I mentioned Plato and friends reasoning their way to a greatest conceivable being. And when we're starting with just this point of who is God? Again, the attributes of God, you can give us a bunch of words to describe, but just to say, no God in your mind, What can you do with that blank slate and conceive of who God is? And using Western philosophy again, going back to people who sat around and tried to reason their way to a greatest conceivable being, would reason their way to this foundational idea that this God is the only necessary being. So under God point one, I want to make the argument that he is necessary. So you're like, what kind of what attribute is that? Well, we'll get there. Throughout history, notable Christian thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas to C.S. Lewis, employed rational reasoning to argue for an existence of God from three different angles...a cosmological argument which usually went something like if you see a bunch of effects, there needs to be a first cause, and then you might have a teleological argument Telos, the end game. Meaning, well, if we see the results of something, not necessarily effects, but this idea of complexity, a big universe or intricacy, a watch, there's a watchmaker who's responsible for it. And so that could be an argument for there has to be something greater, a greatest conceivable being. We just don't get this stuff. And then lastly, there could be the moral argument, the one that says, why should we care about truth and goodness? Well, what kind of universe are we in that says, Lewis uses this in the beginning of Mere Christianity, if you're on the train with me and you walk up and stamp on my foot that you did something wrong, versus if, I walk by you and I accidentally trip over your foot, I don't view those two things as the same. One could be accidental. Another one of those could be intentional. And, um, if there's no moral goodness in the universe, then who cares which reason I had for doing it? So that would be in Christian philosophical history, I guess, if you want to call it that. Different arguments for a starting point that all they were trying to do was establish that there is a greatest conceivable being. There's a cause, there's a mover, there's a watchmaker. They're not saying who gets to name him yet. They're just establishing can we establish the necessity of a higher power? And once you can establish that again by saying, what's the explanation for everything we see around us? Once you can establish that, then classical theism would move into what? Now I want to narrow it down and say, out of all the options, the most logical option, and we would add using our Bible with the biblical option is only the God of the Bible revealed in Scripture and through His Son Jesus Christ. So the idea of God being necessary, it takes a mind to know a mind. If I can think up the idea of God as necessary, that's a first step in the direction of God's existence. I know as far as I know myself, that I exist. But and this is that first step, I'm not responsible for my own existence. Now, dads, sometimes we go too far with our responsibility when we say, I brought you into this world and I can. Well, you're almost right about that one. Yeah, you did bring them into this world. But yeah, you didn't bring yourself into this world. Meaning you're not a necessary being. In the same way God is. What we would say is you are a contingent being. As in, you aren't responsible for you. You're not the explanation for you. Something far more impressive than you explains you and David understood that, and he took no classes of Western philosophy. David understood when he looked at the heavens the work of God's hands. And then he considered himself that he wasn't the explanation for himself. But he asked, what is man that you are mindful of him? And the answer is...not much. It's true. We're contingent. What's the difference between a necessary and a contingent being?...independence and dependence. Now all the dads are shaking their head when they think about how long they had dependents on their tax forms and when they finally got them off. Or a conditional versus an unconditional being. You and I are all conditional beings. God isn't. You and I are all dependent beings and God isn't. We have needs and God has no needs. He's the only necessary being, as in, he is necessary for what?...everyone else who is contingent or dependent on him. You can see the difference between this necessary God and needy man in psychology. Some of you know of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It was a psychological theory proposed by Abraham Maslow, one of the most cited psychologists in the 20th century, who categorized human needs into five levels...physiological, safety, belonging, esteem, and self-actualization. And the hierarchy as a pyramid implies that we humans advance from basic survival needs to more complex. Ultimately, the greatest one being, self-actualization. I found my purpose here on Earth. Interestingly enough, that's usually where you arrive with people who seem to be, questioning their existence. What am I here for? They may have everything else solved. They may have moved in that hierarchy idea from. Yeah, I got my basic needs met and I'm doing okay. But why do I exist for...self-actualization...what's my purpose? Contrast that with God's hierarchy of needs. He has how many? None. God just is...in the Trinity God is completely satisfied in himself needs nothing else for his existence. If I would have taken that same triangle pyramid and put it up there, it would have been empty. Because God is the only necessary being with no needs. And that's not God being mulish...obstinate. I don't want anybody's help. It's actually an extension of what? His Godness. It's just who he is. It's God being God. It's not that God disdains being helped. His needlessness is an extension of his nature. He needs not because he exists necessarily, not dependent on or determined by anyone else's existence. Now, we just got to where we've arrived at this point by just using our what?...our minds to know a mind. Now let's look at Scripture to actually give us a firm foundation that our feet aren't planted firmly in the air. We might have reasoned, but our reasoning could have been incorrect. So let's listen to Paul's reasoning in Acts 17. Turn there. Paul talks about God being necessary amidst talking to some of the smartest cats in his day, as he was in Athens. He makes this point very clear, in his words, to these Greek sophists who were always who were always trying to figure out these philosophers back in verse 18, Epicurean and Stoic philosophers conversing who are always trying to figure out the, as we talked about earlier, the greatest conceivable being. But because they couldn't narrow it down to like, who really is like at the top of this chart of greatest conceivable beings, they would just leave it wide open to a lot of options, sort of relativism, maybe even a pragmatism. You do you...whatever God works for you, that's fine. And Paul comes along and says, can I have a word with you? Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects. For while I was passing through and examining the objects, note many gods. It was the Roman cynic, Petronius, who worked for the emperor, who said the phrase, it's easier to find a god in Athens than it is a man. That's how pluralistic this society was at that time. So when Paul says, uh, examining the objects of your worship. Everywhere he looked, there was false gods, false worship. Yet people looking for truth, goodness and beauty to some degree or another. And he finds an altar with an inscription to an unknown god. So he seizes the opportunity. Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you the God who made the world. Notice where he starts. Creation. Creation. Friends, that's not a throwaway category for us. And all the things in it. Since he is Lord of heaven and earth, he does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is he served by human hands as though he needed anything. God is necessary, yet has no needs. We have the needs, not him. Since he himself, why does he have no needs? He himself gives. He's the life giver. He's the one who has it all for those who have nothing and are dependent. He himself gives to all people life and breath and all things. There friends is the argument for God's necessity. Paul says in the abundance of idols in ancient Athens and false worship dedicated to many gods and goddesses. Fellas, you missed one. Yahweh is the highest God of all. He is the uncreated creator and the quality that sets him apart. He starts with his necessity. That's what sets him apart. He needs nothing of what any of you. All this foolishness. You guys bringing different things to your false gods as if they need you to survive. This god...this unknown god on one of your idol inscriptions. He has no needs, verse 25. He is necessary. He used their own philosophical reasoning to his advantage to show that a true God that has the power to exist in and of himself, and not depending on anything outside of itself and everyone is dependent on him, is a being that must, must necessarily exist. Not because you want him to. He must if he is actually the one true God. So that's what you start with when we start with God, he's pure necessity. So parents, next time you get...who made God, you just say he's necessary. Next question. Just move right along from there. Sure, your kid will get it.

Point two God Is. When we say God is eternal, we've covered that he's necessary. Now we're going to cover what is...is. Glad you asked. It was actually asked by a philosopher named Parmenides before the time of Plato. That was his great contribution to Greek philosophy, he asked the question, what is, is? Well, we can look up the word and find out that it's a verb of being. Right? You look it up in a dictionary. It's the third person singular of be. And that's just all we need to really establish for establishing God is he's not just necessary, but he is existence itself. He is being. The word for that that philosophers came up with, theological philosophers is God's Aseity...a say it with me, aseity. Um, it's actually the correct pronunciation of the thing. A lot of you butcher when you go to get that acai bowl down at the old copper bean. Hey, let's go get some acai bowls. aa.saa.ee It's aa.saa.ee. I only know that because I used to say akea. When I was living on the West Coast, I mispronounced everything I could mispronounce in Los Angeles. And some of these notes, aa,saa.ee, Friend. So aseity and aseity is a word that comes from the Latin 'se' meaning from or by himself, as in God is whoever he is by his own. And here's what aseity is...self existence. Sohe's a necessary being, the one that we could conceive of, that he must be the God of all gods, and then he is a self-existent, necessary being. He doesn't need anything else but himself. And in fact, if you put those two together, his aseity flows from his necessity. So God necessary IS. And if is means to be or pure existence, then out of that necessity. God is self existent. Uh, to remember that I came up with an acronym. It's a really complicated one for the word is. Aseity is contained in the idea that God is, and that is in my mind, I remember it by  thinkingabout...He's infinitely sovereign. So when you think about his self existence, can we land that? And I was thinking about it and thought of the phrase God is infinitely sovereign. His aseity is seen in his infinite sovereignty over everything else, that we are subject to...time, space, and matter. He's infinitely sovereign over time. He's omni temporal. He is outside, and over time. He is infinitely sovereign over space. He is over all places at all times. We know that from Psalm 139. We say it often where can you flee from God's presence?...nowhere, because of his omnipresence. And then he's infinitely sovereign over matter. He's sovereign over all powers, seen and unseen. So that is his infinite sovereignty as the self-existent, necessary God. All things created; time, space and matter are under the infinite sovereignty of the God who is. He's pure existence. He's the foundation of all being. He exists only in himself. Now back to Psalm 8. All that contained then, in considering the heavens and the work of his hands, this God who is magnificent in all the earth and majestic. And yet we think about ourselves and say, and we are completely opposite of that. We, on the other hand, are not necessary as he is, and we are dependent as he is not. We are not self-existent, we are dependent and we change. We age and die. In our imperfect beingness, we still age. We're constantly becoming. I think at 40 you become less. Prior to 40 you're becoming more. And then you hit this thing called your 40s and everything is, uh, it's on the downhill. But God is unchanging in his perfect being. He is the same. What? Yesterday, today, and forever. And sometimes I think we localize that in God's actions. You know, I can depend on him, you know, yesterday, today, forever. His love, his mercy, his grace. But also it's just also who he is. He is never changed at all in all eternity...anything about him because he's perfect in his self-existence. Or to say it the way God said about himself. Go to Exodus 3. When he wanted to reveal: himself and his identity in Exodus 3:14, speaking to Moses from a burning bush. When Moses said to God, Exodus 3:13, behold, I am going to the sons of Israel, and I will say to them the God of your fathers has sent me to you. Now they may say to me, what is his name? Because earlier in this interaction, when the angel of the Lord appeared to Moses in a blazing fire from the midst of a bush, the Lord says, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So he says, you should know me, Moses. Um, your history, all of your people go back to me. But just saying, I'm the God of Abraham. Isaac and your forefathers didn't say anything about his name, did it? Just told him that. Hey, man, the god that you heard about growing up. But again, remember Moses was raised in the courts of Pharaoh, so he heard about a lot of gods. So he has to remind him, no, there was one god in particular, the God that you know. That's me. But I've never actually told youmy name. So Moses says, well, what am I going to say your name is? God said to Moses, and here is aseity. Here is Self-existence. I am who I am. And again, that Hebrew...I am...is a verb for to be, I'm being, which is the best name God could give to himself. I say that not because my opinion means anything, it's in the Bible. But when you think about it, all the names in the Bible that have significance, we have talked about that in our first Samuel series. Samuel's name had significance. God is my name. God hears. Names mattered in the Bible. Eve...mother of all the living. Adam...dirt. I'm talking about aseity. I'm losing some of you. I could see it. But God's name is just being...existence...aseity. I just am. The phrase I am who I am implies an assertion of what? Absolutes. Autonomy. I just AM. That's it. Now, because we humans, you know, we could hear something like that. It's like, ah, but what is it like? How awesome is God in that when he reveals his name to Moses...how's he doing it again? He's doing it with a burning bush. A bush that it says back in verse two, it's burning with fire, yet it's not consumed. It's almost as if that bush is Self-existent. It should have been...down to the ground. You ever walked around in a wilderness, especially a desert like area. You set something on fire. It's kaput. It's gone. It would burn itself up. And here is this bush that Moses is looking at. And the one true God is talking to him, and he's giving him a physical example of a spiritual thing. Here is this bush that has this seeming appearance of self-existence. It's blazing in fire, and yet none of it is being consumed. It just is...a burning bush. But it's not nothing. Nothing is. It's violating the laws of physics, right? It should be disappearing. It should be falling to the ground. It should be going up in smoke. No, it's a perfect bush and it's on fire. And it's continually that way this whole conversation...pretty awesome. Not just the Aseity of God, but the Aseity of God represented in the burning bush. God as ultimate origin and cause of his own being and actions. So, as Psalm 8 has shown us, there's this point we get to this. This paradox here is this great and wondrous God, and here is me. And one of the things that we have a tendency to do, to speak of when we speak of God, is to speak of him in the same terms as we speak of all the beings. There's been a created order, if you will, from a highest form, a supreme being, angelic beings to human beings, to yinzers right above y'allers, and so on and so forth, right down to the rocks. And then of course, the influencers. And this is this is the order of society. This is the order of creation. But there's a problem with this idea of God being in the created order, isn't there, because the created order implies it had to be created and God's not created. So calling him the Supreme Being is injustice to him, isn't it? Because he is pure being. He is the Supreme Being that makes every one of us something else. So R.C. Sproul says that's not how it goes. And he articulated this well. He says, it's not the adjectives before that we get wrong. It's the what? It's the word after. As you get to the top of the ladder, you have a supreme being suggesting there's a thing as being that we're all part of. But that's the difference between God and angels and us and a box of rocks. Even when I quote Sproul, I start to get a little growly like Sproul. However, the difference between the Supreme Being and the human beings is not in the adjectives, it's in the noun...being. If there's ever been a misnomer, it's to refer to God and us as beings. None of us are being in the way God is being. That's a good Psalm 8 adjustment, isn't it, to say, you know God, you are not in the same category as the rest of us, as necessary and self-existent. Everything else in that line of creation is other. You are alone the one true God. And that's why, when you go back to Psalm 8 that's sandwiched inside of this wonderful oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth, oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. When I put together the paradox of your greatness and my me...ness. This is what I come to. I was thinking about this differentiation on Friday. The Ashoffs have become urban farmers. We've got chickens. These chickens are not the most fascinating things to watch, and they feel the same way about me. Sometimes I walk out into the garage, which stinks. They have to stay in the garage until they can be on their own. So me and my eight chicks were in a staredown on Friday. Their 16 eyes against mine. But it's hard because they can only look out of the one side. And with all these wonderful thoughts of eternality and aseity and necessity in my mind, there was me and these chickens. And I wondered what they were thinking about looking at me. What we know from Genesis 1...chickens have had a one day head start on the rest of us. But here we are. They work for me. They will produce eggs for me. And as much as I could speak of chickens with a slight disdain. Truly, who has more in common?...me and the chicken or me and God? The Smithsonian Museum of Natural History says that me and those chickens that I speak ill of, they haven't produced yet. Okay. Once they produce, come back and talk to me in October. I'll love those chickens. Um, we share a 75% similarity in our genome code. We share a 98% similarity to chimps. You know, that being thing, we share a 60% genome with fruit flies and banana trees. And now I've solved the mystery of why fruit flies love your bananas. They're the same. We humans, no matter how different all of us look in this room, share a 99.9% genome code, which on a side note makes racism a sin to repent of friends. Any of the smallest form of it in you ethnic vain glory that you have a little bit different skin tone. It's not only a sin to repent of, it's just a really dumb idea, isn't it? Scientifically, it's a very idiotic idea. Back to the sermon. All this chicken and chimp stuff to highlight that as much as I might think of myself superior to my chickens, I am part of the same created made Genesis 1 life form as them. God's aseity his absolute autonomy makes me supremely subordinate to him forever. Because, like those chickens, I had a beginning. But God didn't. And I'll have an earthly end like they will. But yet for all eternity, I will only exist because God always has and always will exist. We'll live forever. But that actually never moves us from the category of created being into what?...creators. Because even for all eternity, we will exist as dependent on who?...God. You'll stay in existence for all eternity if you really want that thing that keeps you up at night, right? When you start to either think about how, who, where did God come from? Or how long is eternity going to be. And well, as long as God. Even in the eternal state, we will still be contingent, dependent worshippers. None of us will ever stray outside of that into God's box of being necessary and being self-existent. No, you will always, and even in your glorified state, we will be so unrecognizable, even to ourselves and others, in that glorified state, in the eternal state. And yet we will be what?...dependent, contingent beings. Perfected from sin, yes, but never existent outside of him. Revelation 21 and 22 is the eternal state, the new heavens and the new earth. And all of it is wonderful. And we receive a miraculous and marvelous upgrade into a glorified state. And yet, who is the one that is keeping it all? Who is the one that is moving it forward outside of time? Revelation 21:22, I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the lamb are the temple, and this city has no need of the sun or the moon to shine on it. Sun and moon don't need you anymore, God says, because the glory of God has illumined it, and the lamp is the lamb. The self-existence continues on for all eternity. Brothers and sisters, so get used to it. With any sense of autonomy perceived this morning by us the creation for all eternity...you're dependent. You're contingent on the self-existent God. It's a humbling thought and a wonderful thought, which then finally gets us to eternality.

God is eternal throughout the Bible, this necessary and self-existent God is known as eternal, everlasting, forever. Yet to get to the destination of eternality, we had to stop by necessity and aseity. Because for God to be eternal, he would have to be independent of any factors outside of himself. That's why I took the long walk for the short drink of water, so to speak. Otherwise, and again, put this all together with God's eternality if something else is responsible for God's beginning to start him, or able to cause his end, that would mean there is a greater being than God, and that greater being is the new God of God. Right? So you see how it all fits together now...necessity, aseity and eternality. Anything that could then be responsible, that we could find out, that could be the start of God or the end of God. That's the new God. So Eternality builds upon necessity and asity. So let's think on that as we close the scriptures, what they say of God's eternality. Well, of course we meet the eternal God in Genesis 1:1. In the beginning God created. That's the created order. He's outside of it. He created the heavens and the earth and everything that is there. No preface, no backstory. Do you just meet your maker before you were made God in Genesis 1 is the uncaused cause. He's the explanation for everything. He made it all himself. Job 26:7 says he stretches out the north over empty space and hangs the earth on nothing. The irony of God's necessity, aseity and eternality is it accords with science. When science wants, for the sake of rejecting God, to break its own laws. I'll say that again. The irony of God's necessity, aseity and eternality is that it accords with scientific law when science wants, for the sake of rejecting God, to go and break its own laws. I present to you my Google AIing this week. Science says according to Google AI, the idea that something cannot come from nothing is a cornerstone of the law of conservation...science, which states that neither matter nor energy can be created or destroyed, only transformed. While often used in a philosophical context, it also applies to scientific understanding, particularly in relation to the origins of the universe. The Big Bang theory while a scientific model explaining the universe's expansion, doesn't directly address how the initial singularity came into being, raising questions about the fundamental origin of what?...everything. Everything. The idea that nothing comes from nothing is a fundamental principle in philosophy and physics called ex nihilo nihil fit...out of nothing, nothing is produced. Something can't be created from nothing. It aligns with the law of conservation of energy that the total energy in a closed system remains constant. For us common folk, you can't make something out of nothing. Science will tell you you can. We would say there's a need for something existing before you create or achieve something new. In short, science breaks its own laws to explain how everything started. But guess who doesn't? God doesn't because he's the one that created the scientific laws that we humans discover that have been there since the beginning. Romans 11:36 for from him and through him, and to him are what all things, all math, all physics, all philosophy, all things are his. That's just such a foundational promise to trust in whatever, whatever area of life, whatever discipline you want to go into young people, college kids, you're not going to discover something that's suddenly going to...poof God out of existence because of that. You may have your doubts. And that's understandable. But there's nothing that's going to come out of the created order of God's world that's going to make him disappear unless you, in your pride, want it to be so, which is what Romans 1 tells us, isn't it? That the knowledge of the creator is in all of us, but we lie against the truth to justify our own lustful desires. We really want to push God outside the realm of existence, not so much because we can come up with this idea that disproves him, that his existence is kind of a nag, isn't it, to some people? Because with that teleological and cosmological argument that says you can't make something out of nothing, there's the moral argument. If I grant that he's there, then he tells me what I need to do. And we don't like that, do we? The necessity of our eternal God as creator of all creation is the only logical explanation. But it's not just logic. We have the Word of God. So here's just some scriptures. When we open up the Bible in the entirety of Scripture from start to finish, that cries out God is eternal! Job 36:26 the oldest book in the Bible. Behold, God is exalted and we do not know him? The number of his years is unsearchable. What does it mean God is exalted and we do not know him. Well he has to reveal himself to us. Though it takes a mind to know a mind, he has to what? Show us through creation and His Word and His Son who he is. Because look, the number of his years, his eternality, it's unsearchable. And again, this comes from the oldest book in the Bible...Job. Old uneducated Job could look to the heavens and be amazed by this unsearchable, yet knowable God, because he revealed himself to Job. Psalm 93:1-2, the Lord reigns. He is clothed with majesty. The Lord is clothed and girded himself with strength. Indeed, the world is firmly established by the great establisher. It will not be moved. Your throne, O God, is established from old. You are from everlasting. Psalm 93:1-2. Isaiah 40:28-29. Do you not know? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, does not become weary or tired. That's his immutability. That's his unchanging ness. He can't get weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary. And to him who lacks might, he increases power. Do you see just how naturally Isaiah connects this idea of these grandiose thoughts of this great God we serve to something so helpful as because he is limitless in his power and he is never drained of 1% battery life. You can plug into him all the time for the power that you need, but not into yourself. That would be that closed loop. It's not just that God is everlasting. So is His Word, an extension of his eternal being. Psalm 119:89. Forever, O Lord, your word is settled in heaven. Psalm 119:89. His word has always been settled in heaven. Psalm 119:160, the sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous ordinances is everlasting. All of it. The parts, the whole. It's truth. It's everlasting. That's what those philosophers were trying to find. What is the greatest conceivable being that gives value to truth, beauty and goodness. And it's in the Word of God. And they had it and they ignored it. Isaiah 48. We say it often. The grass withers and the flower fades. But the word of our God stands forever. And it's not just the Word of God, it's the fullness of God in bodily form who came to reveal him. John 17:3, this is eternal life, Jesus said. That they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. For any skeptic out there today, do you know what eternal life actually is? Maybe you grew up in the church and it was just always about heaven...everything after. No, Jesus says eternal life is here and now in him because he reconciles you to the eternal God. You can have a relationship with the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the one who formed you in your mother's womb, the one who knows your days. You don't know them. Eternal life is not just a then and there idea like I used to think it was. Eternal life is a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. That's eternal life. And the great thing is, you don't have to wait for it. Brother or sister in Christ, you have it right now. Whoever may not be in Christ this morning that happens to be here today, you can have eternal life. How do you get it? 1 John 5:10, the one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony. What testimony?...the testimony of God. The one who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has given concerning his Son. And the testimony is this that God has given us eternal life, and that life is in His Son. So everything inscrutable, unsearchable that you have heard about God this morning, the testimony God gives about himself from the scriptures to have it all and to believe it all, and to know it all in its fullness. The key that opens that lock for you to eternal life is actually in Jesus Christ. And here back in Acts 17, here is the thing that you have to believe and know about Jesus that Paul preached to these lost philosophers. It's at the end of his speech that caused them to question themselves. When Paul said in Acts 17:31, God has fixed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness, that judgment is a sin and righteousness issue that is all headed towards. So listen up, unbeliever, this morning. This is where all history is headed towards. There is a day that is fixed where God will judge the world in righteousness through a man. That man is Jesus Christ, whom he has appointed, having furnished proof to all men. And how did he give the proof? By raising him from the dead. So I know that there's concepts this morning that you can't and I can't fully fathom. Uh, to believe in God's eternality and aseity and necessity. It is not necessary for the gospel in the sense I got to figure out God's necessity and asiety and eternality to become a Christian. No, you're not going to figure that out, but you do need to know this about that God. He will judge you and the rest of the world according to the righteousness of His Son, Jesus Christ. And the proof that he's given you today is that he was raised from the dead. My mind falls apart. It even did this week. When I'm thinking like..no God, but like I get I can study this stuff all week and plumb the depths of it, and I can lay awake at night and think, but really, where did you come from? Like you got a burning bush. Please. Something you know. Look outside. My tree's on fire. It's probably the neighborhood kids, but I would have taken that this week. When you start to get those doubts, like, how do I know eternity? And do you know what solves that problem for me? That Jesus came back from the dead. When I can't fathom the unfathomable parts of who God is, I end up exactly where Paul ended up here. That the proof...why all of it holds together. Why I can trust it, is because the thing I have to be able to grasp and hold on to is that there has been no one who can refute that God sent His Son to forgive sinners like me, and that by believing he died on the cross in my place and being raised from the dead, I'm forgiven, I believe that. And because I believe that I can trust everything else. Everything else that this book says. Do you believe the facts about Jesus? The Son of God, the Son of Man, sent to save perfect life, dies on the cross in your place and is raised for your justification to prove that you're forgiven. And if you can hold that together in your mind that good news of the gospel, the rest of the stuff can come. So call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ today and be saved. I knew I would run out of time. And the irony is, it's a sermon about eternality. So the joke's on you. I mean, what did you expect me to do with a sermon about the eternality of God? Believer, I want to give you three implications before we move into a time at the Lord's table. Three implications from that God is necessary. God is self-existent and God is eternal.
First implication...how does the necessity of God humble me to seek him with greater dependence? How does thinking on the necessity of God? Well, it certainly trumps my priorities that my life fits inside of his life. He's necessary. I'm contingent. He's the only necessary being in the universe. And I exist for him. So any sense of my own indispensability...here's what R.C. Sproul says. The most crowded places for indispensable people are the cemeteries of the world. Isn't that the great equalizer? Oh, that's not the quote, by the way. You can discard that. That was something else. I kind of let hit the cutting room floor. This quote was much better. It was shorter. The most crowded places for indispensable people. People that think that everything rests on them are the people that are where?...in the cemeteries, like the rest of us will be. That's where it ends. And your indispensability and your necessity is over at that point. We must understand that everything exists for God, for his glory and majesty, and out of that comes the purpose of our being. So if it rains on your well-planned beach vacation like it did mine. God, you're necessary. I'm not. Go buy some board games and have a good time. It ended up being sunny the next day.

Number two. How does the aseity of God, His self-existence, inspire me to worship him with greater earnestness? How does the aseity of God inspire me to worship him with greater earnestness? Remembering God is his infinite sovereignty over time, space and matter is a good way to solve some of our mental health woes. Because a lot of those the buzzword that mental health is today is you're pointed to solving it within you. Like think more about you and what you need. No, the Bible would point us like Psalm 8 did, to think about someone outside of you. Think about the great God who has no needs, who is self-existent. J.I. Packer wrote, in our life of faith, we easily impoverish ourselves by embracing an idea of God that is too limited and small, and the doctrine of God's aseity stands as a bulwark against despairing of our own finite lives. So how does the aseiety of God inspire you to worship him with greater earnestness?
And then three. How does the eternality of God comfort me to trust him with greater assurance? I didn't plan on using Psalm 8 this week until Wednesday. That's when a friend of ours here, a brother in Christ, was hours away from eternity. Larry Ferguson, who we prayed for last Sunday. The Lord took him home Thursday night. So I was studying for a sermon and came across a footnote to a footnote that led me to R.C. Sproul's Holiness of God in a chapter called Looking Through the Shadows. And I have that book because I have all of Larry Ferguson's old R.C. Sproul books. He gave them to me. He used to be a bookstore owner and he had signed copies. I love R.C. Sproul. They were signed copies to Larry, but I'll take them anyway. Um, and it was in reading on Psalm 8, in Looking Beyond Shadows, that Sproul wrote this, what with the meager resources the psalmist had when he gazed into the night sky of Palestine, he was overwhelmed by the weighty sense of contrast between the magnificence of the heavens and the relative obscurity of his own life. By considering the stars, he was forced to ask the ultimate question about his existence what is man that you are mindful of him? And so that was that Wednesday. And I was going to go see Larry, because I just wanted to go see him at lunch, and I drop in on him unannounced. And, um, Psalm 8 was on my heart. So I shared Psalm 8 with him, and what I wanted to share with him was, um, though your outer man is decaying, your inner man is being renewed day by day, and there's an eternal weight of glory for you. That far distances the confines of your hospice bed. Now he couldn't respond. He had no strength to speak at this point. You've been with people like that. What do people like that need at that moment? They need the Word of God to remind them, O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. And then I said to him, um. Who is Larry that our majestic God was mindful of him. Well, you know who God is, Larry. He sees you right here, right now. And he squeezed my hand. That's all he could do. It's all I thought he could do. And then he gets the strength and his eyes get big, and he speaks. And he says, go up to my room and get more books. I'm like. So I go up to his room. I was going to do what he was going to tell me to do. So I go up and get a couple more books. And, um. I bring them down because, like, a good accountant, librarian, whatever skills Larry had administratively, he wanted me to check them out. So I bring the books back down, and he wants to see what I took. And he points out this book on the end times, the world to come. And he's pointing, and he wants me to open it. And I'm thinking to see a signature. And it wasn't. He wanted me to flip to a page. It was a picture of eternity, of from creation to eternity. And just wanted to point at what? The return of Christ. Because when you think on the eternality of God and the magnificence of him, and you know him personally, you're ready to meet him. That's your hope in life and death. Nothing short of that, friends. And that's what's going to matter for all of us. Who is Larry that our majestic God was mindful of him. It's the same as any of his adopted children. Because God is. And because we're his. We have what? Hope.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you this morning for your word. We thank you that now, as we come to the Lord's table, as already feasting on your word and served by your spirit, the best meal is yet to come, because it's the meal that reminds us of Christ, your life and your death and your resurrection. Which is what Paul said when it all comes down to the great Judgment Day, we will be judged by our righteousness within ourselves or the righteousness we have by faith in him, which is it going to be. I pray that everyone in here would know, without a shadow of a doubt in their soul, that their hope is in Christ alone. Their eternal life hangs on him, and that they would put all of their hope in him, all of their trust in him. And spirit, only you can do that work. So I pray you would. Amen.

Be a Messenger This Summer

Matt McCarthy

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Be a Messenger This Summer

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It really is great to be here. As Adam mentioned, in 2015, I became a church planter and I went through an organization in Chicago called Harvest Bible Fellowship. This church was a part of it then we were a part of that then. We are no longer a part of it. You are no longer a part of it. But I'm thankful for it because it created a relationship with us, with you. And so I was here for about 6 or 8 weeks and studying under some of the leadership of your church. Believe it or not, we actually had our first core group meeting. Um, I think it's, uh, is it the Ryle Room? I don'tknow, I'm trying to remember which room it was...like a nice banquet room. Is that the Ryle room? It is the Ryle Room. Okay. All right. So we had our first core group meeting. We brought like, 40 people up from High Point. They worshiped right over in this section right here with you guys. We had a dinner that you guys put on for all those people that came from High Point. Uh, Kurt Gebhart was the pastor then, and he and I talked and we had 32 people commit to being a part of our church plant team. So it all kind of started right here. And of all the churches that I know, there was only one church. I don't know what that says about me or what it says about you, but there was only one church that partnered with us financially, and it was this church right here. And your generosity, basically, it planted somegospel seeds and, um, it helped plant our church. And our church has grown into, um, it's more than 30 people. It's about 300 people. And as Adam just mentioned, we just bought a new facility in a very strategic location of High Point. If you know, High Point at all, I'm sure some of you do because of furnituremarket. Um, we bought a place in High Point, North Carolina. It's the old Barnes and Noble across from High Point University. And already we've been there about 15 months, 18 months, and we've doubled in size. We've been out the last 15 weeks because we're doing a massive renovation. And we are hoping, and we are praying that that new location will give us many, manymission opportunities. So that's how you can be praying for us.

I do want to say, before we get into God's Word, um, one of the things that I remember about this church in particular is their is their hospitality, the generosity that I just spoke about. And I have experienced that all weekend. I got to hang out with David Duncan yesterday. We drove around in his convertible. Uh, we talked ministry and we drank coffee. And it was great to fellowship with you, David. And then, of course, last night I went over to Steve and Mandy's house and they just put on an awesome steak dinner. And, um, yeah, it's been awesome. So, Adam, thank you for treating me so, so well.

One last thing I'm a little upset about. There's a couple right over here, and of course I get it. They're from here. They grew up here. Their dad's an elder here. But Will and Kaitlyn Duncan were in my small group. We loved them dearly. I was already in my mind, dreaming and scheming of how Will was going to be my little David at my church, but now he's back here. So, um, it's a little bit disappointing, but I love them, and I know they'reso happy to be here, and I'm grateful that they get to be with their family.

If you have your Bible and I know you do, turn with me to John chapter one. If you don't have a Bible, there's probably a Bible in a seat close by and you can turn with me to John chapter one. It's found on page 886. Did I say something wrong? What did I say? All right, I'm going to just keep going. All right? All right, 886 if you don't have a Bible....John chapter one.

You know, growing up, my favorite TV show as a little kid, it was this show called The Baseball Bunch. Do you guysremember the baseball bunch? Any Gen Xers, the baseball bunch, Johnny Bench. Yeah, so I played, I played baseball, I played catcher as a kid. And so the host of the show was Johnny Bench. Many people considered Johnny Bench to maybe be one of, at least at that time, probably the greatest catcher ever. And of course, I, I'm super competitive. I wanted to learn from the best so that I could be the best. So every Saturday morning I'dget up and I would watch that show closely. I would study the techniques. I would be watching the hitting lessons, the catching lessons. But here's the deal. Every Saturday I woke up early to learn from Johnny, and then I would go outside with my brotherand I would try to put into practice a lot of the things that he had just taught. Now, why would I do that? Because here's the deal. I didn't just want to play baseball. I wanted to get better. And I wanted to be the best version of me.

And I share that with you for simply this reason. When it comes to our evangelism and discipleship, which Adam has asked me to talk about as we go into the summer, a lot of times what happens is it's kind of like that summer slumber when it's like, oh, rest, and I can take some time off from ministry and I can kind of relax. Well, I'm sharing that story with you because when it comes to our evangelism and discipleship, we need to take on that mindset of, I want to be the best version of me.

And there are I would say there are experts in the scriptures that we need to watch and learn from. In the passage of Scripture that we're looking at this morning, the apostle John points us to the greatest messenger so that we will live as messengers in our city this summer. 

So here's the big idea I call it the big idea. It's the one thought that I want you to walk away with this morning. The greatest messenger, John the Baptist...he shows every messenger how and the way to live as a messenger this summer. That's kind of. I added that part.

Here we go, John chapter one, starting in verse six, "There was a man sent from God whose name was John." Now, of course, John the Apostle, Jesus best friend, the beloved apostle, is writing. He's not writing about himself. He's talking about John the Baptist. "There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light." Drop down to verse 19, "and this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, who are you? He confessed and did not deny, but confessed. I am not the Christ. And they asked him, what then, are you Elijah? He said, I am not. Are you the prophet? And he answered, no. So they said to him, who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself? He said, I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah said. Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. They asked him, then why are you baptizing if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet? John answered them, I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know.Even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. These things took place in Bethany, across the Jordan, where John was baptizing. The next day...so this is day two. He saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, after me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me. I myself did not know him"...even though he grew up with him. "But for this purpose I came baptizing with water that he might be revealed to Israel. And John bore witness. I saw the spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, he on whom you see the spirit descend and remain

This is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit. And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God. The next day...day three. Again John was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, behold, the Lamb of God. The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus."

Let's pray together. Father, we are so thankful to be here to worship the Son of God. And we have worshiped the Son of God. And now we get to hear from the Word of God so that we can be better worshipers for the glory of God. And so we ask you, Spirit of God, will you use the Word of God in a way that only you can speak it to us, so that we can be transformed for the glory of God? It's in his name we pray. Amen.

You know, we're parachuting into a passage of Scripture. So I just want to give you a brief background. The author, as I mentioned a moment ago, it is John, the beloved disciple. And the reason why John is writing this whole gospel is to convince his readers that Jesus is the Messiah. He's trying to convince the readers. It's been about 50 years since the resurrection. He'strying to convince them that Jesus is who he said he was. There has been a drift. There's some questions. Was he the man who he said he was? Even churchgoing people were beginning to wonder...who was Jesus. And of course, John is trying to clarify for the readers that he is indeed the Son of God. In chapter one it's all about the eternal word that Jesus is fully God. He's the creator of all things. He's the source of life and the light that the darkness can't overcome. And in verses six through eight, though, and in verses 19 through 37, which I just read to you, John takes the attention off of Jesus majesty, and he puts it on Jesus messenger, John the Baptist. At our church we call him JB...John the Baptist. We have JB the messenger and we have Jesus Christ the Messiah, and we call them JB and JC sometimes because they were cousins and they grew up together. And I like to think that they had a really close knit, tight relationship. Now, for those of us, though, who grew up in church, we probably weprobably know John the Baptist pretty well. And I don't know about you, but when I think of John the Baptist, I think honestly, I think weird. You know what I'm saying? He was a little bit weird. He lived in...how many of you been to Israel? Anybody? Alright, so when you go to Israel, when you head out into the desert, that's where John the Baptist lived. That is a weird place to live. But not only did he live in a desert, which is a little bit weird. His wardrobe was camel hair. I like audience participation. His wardrobe was camel hair, which means he was...weird. Yeah. So are you getting it. All right, we're close. We're close. Like three of you got it. His diet, I'm going to keep throwing them at you until you guys participate, okay? His diet was locusts and honey. He was...Weird. Yeah. There we go. And if 2000 years from now, people are talking about what you wore, what you ate, and where you lived, you are...weird. Yes, JB was weird. The man looked like a wilderness prophet. He was dressed like a caveman and he acted like a wild man.

But here's the thing. Yes, he was crazy, but he was crazy about Christ. And he was one of the most important people in the New Testament. He is mentioned 89 times in the New Testament. He was the man who introduced Israel to Jesus. He was the forerunner. He was calling people to repentance. And they were responding. I mean massive crowds were coming to hear this guy preach. Unlike Jesus, he wasn't performing miracles. He was just preaching the Word of God. And people would come in droves to hear this man and they would confess Christ. And then, of course, what would he do? He would baptize them. That's why we call him John the Baptizer. And he was doing some powerful ministry as God's messenger.

And here are the lessons that we need to learn if we are going to be messengers from the greatest messenger. This summer I want to give you three musts. It's really hard to say three musts for every messenger this summer. If I want to be a messenger in my city this summer, I must. I must. If I want to reach the person at the pool, I must. If I want to reach my coworker that sits next to me in the cubicle, I must number one, remember my role in redemptive history. 

I must remember my role in redemptive history.

I don't know about you, but I tend to forget a lot of things. One of the things that I hate most in life is all these passwords that I'm supposed to remember. You know what I'm talking about...the password thing. And then they're like, sorry, your password has been compromised. And so what are you supposed to do? You're supposed to come up with a new password. And I'm a simple guy. I just have four Bible verses that I use for my passwords. But it's hard to remember some things. Our church is going through a renovation right now, and I'm always walking around the building, and I always typically have a cup of coffee in my hand, and I will put my coffee somewhere in that 25,000 square foot building. And the next thing I know, I'm looking for my coffee. Like I have a hard time remembering where I put things. Forgetting those kind of things...not a big deal...not life and death situations. However, one thing we often forget that is a life and death situation for some is the role that we play in redemptive history. Have you thought about that lately? Have you taken a moment to just think about the role that you play in redemptive history?

I love this guy, John the Baptist because he understood that. Look at what verses six through eight say about John the Baptist. Verse six makes it very clear that JB was commissioned by God. Verse six says, there was a man. Say it with me. What are the next three words...sent from God...whose name was John. The reason John says, the apostle John says, that JB was sent by God is because it's very simple. Remember this, this man, if you if you go back to Luke chapter one, I mean, he was a miracle baby. Do you remember that story? Remember who his dad was? Who was his dad? Yeah. I heard someone say it. Zacharias. What was the job of Zacharias? He was a priest. Who was that priest named Zacharias married to...Elizabeth. Elizabeth was a cousin to who? Mary. Yeah. You guys are on fire right now. You're rolling. Mary is the mother of who? Jesus. Yeah. I mean, he was a he was a miracle baby. So much so that angels announced his arrival. When we think of angels, we get that silly version of the cartoon kind of angel. Don't we? Like the ones strumming on the harp in the cloud? But listen, J.B. was weird, but angels were more weird. Okay, you study angel ology, man, those things were scary looking. Multiple wings, multiple faces on the head. Those angels meet up with Zacharias, and they announce JB's arrival. And they basically say that he was going to be the forerunner to the Messiah. And of course, Zechariah laughed it off. Right? But I bring that all up to say, like this man, he was commissioned by God. He was spoken about by the angels. He was the last Old Testament prophet. Remember, for 400 years between the last book of the Bible in the Old Testament, Malachi and the New Testament, 400 years had elapsed. Nothing's been happening. And so people are waiting for this, this Messiah. And of course, the angel comes and says, hey, John the Baptist is going to be the forerunner to the Messiah. And notice what else it says about John the Baptist. Verse seven says he came to testify. Not only was he commissioned by God, but he came to testify. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light. That's the name for Jesus. Jesus is the light of the world. And why did he come? What's the why behind the what? Why did he bear witness aboutthe light. Look at what the verse goes on to say...that all might believe through him. The coworker in the cubicle. The person at the pool...that they might believe in him. Verse eight. He was not the light. Again, John was writing 50 years after the resurrection. There was a lot of confusion about who John the Baptist was. So John the Apostle, he's clarifying John the Baptist's role. He's saying, look, because there's questions. Remember what I said...they're doubting was John the Baptist the Messiah? No, John the Baptist wasn't. He was not the light. But look at verse, verse eight. He came to bear witness about the light. He came to bear witness about the light, because every person you and I know are born in darkness. Romans chapter five says that when we come into this world, we inherit Adam's sin nature. We have a natural bent towards sin. Romans 3:23 says, all have sinned, and that sin has separated us from a holy God. He can't have sin in his presence. And Romans 6:23 goes on to say, for the wages of sin is death. That's a real thing. The coworker in the cubicle and the person at the pool are facing death. Jb and you and me, we came as a witness. And when I say when JB was a witness, like, think courtroom witness for a second. The job of the witness in the courtroom...it's not their job to determine whether or

not someone is guilty or innocent, nobody cares what the witness thinks as far as are they guilty or innocent? What is the job of the witness? The job of the witness is simply to say, here'swhat I know and here's what I saw. This is what happened. And that's John right here. He's basically saying, John the Baptist, here's what I know about Jesus. And here's what I saw. And as he's paving the way for Jesus, he's fearlessly confronting sin because Israel was in a really messy situation, weren't they? Remember Israel? I mean, they read the book of judges. I mean, those people are messed up. And he's fearlessly confronting sin. He's calling for repentance with a nine word sermon. You know, the gospel. Listen, if we're just faithful, God will use his words. We just finished Jonah. Jonah said seven words when he went into Nineveh and the city repented. I was thinking about that this week. As I was looking over this, Jonah says seven words. John the Baptist says nine words. John the Baptist says, "repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." That's it. We have a simple gospel message that we must faithfully proclaim. And if we faithfully proclaim it, if we faithfully proclaim it, people will respond to it. Amen.

And what's crazy about this guy John the Baptist? And I say he was crazy. He's fearlessly confronting sin. But, I mean, he even went before Herod. Remember, Herod married his brother's wife. John the Baptist confronted him. And Herod was a wicked ruler. What it tells me is John had a heart for all people, even those who would persecute him. Look at verse seven. Verse seven tells us why he would testify in this way. Verse seven says that all might believe through him.

Listen, Hickory Bible Church, just as God chose and commissioned John to speak about the Messiah...he has chosen, and he has commissioned every one of us to do the same, hasn't he? That's right. We have been given a commission in Matthew chapter 28. And I know you know this verse, Matthew 28, verse 19, go therefore and make disciples. And I'm not trying to nerd out with you right now, but the reality is simply this...the go...it's a participle meaning in your going, in your going to work tomorrow at the cubicle, in your going to the pool tomorrow...in your going make disciples.

So really practically I want to give you something super interesting. I did a little research, um, about Hickory, North Carolina and the beliefs that the people in Hickory, North Carolina have about Jesus. And I want to show them to you. Soif we can get that slide up, um, you might want to take a picture of this. I find this fascinating. This is your city. This is you guys. This is about a five mile radius, and this is about three years old...3 or 4 years old. This is the best I could come up with. But five miles from this location right here. These are the stats. Those are the percentages. How many people have a personal relationship with Jesus? Only a quarter of the people really believe that they have a personal relationship with Jesus. A quarter of the people are like, no, I don't want a personal relationship with Jesus. And then you have a bunch in the middle. The beliefs about whether or not Jesus actually rosefrom the dead, which is essential to the gospel. That's what verifies that he is who he said he was. 31% strongly agree. Over 55%. I mean, really 60? If you can't really somewhat agree about that. So really, 70% of the people don't really know if Jesus rose from the dead. Like, this is your city, guys. These are your coworkers. Jesus is the only way. Look at that. Only 25% of people believe strongly believe that Jesus is the only way. When he says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Jesus lived a perfect life 23% Jesus was both divine and human. Again, this is an essential Orthodox truth if you're going to be a child of God. That's heartbreaking, isn't it? Because I don't know about you. And what's fascinating to me, David and I were talking today and it's like, I feel like Hickory and High Point were all kind of like, you know, people in High Point and High Point, people know people in Hickory. And, and I guess it's because of all the textiles and the furniture and all that kind of stuff. But what's staggering to me is I did a similar study for our city, and the numbers were nearly exactly the same. Yeah.

And the reality is, is when I walk around my town and when you walk around your town, we forget that every person that we see has a soul, don't we? So really quickly, I want to give you somepractical application, you might want to take a picture of this. Here's how you can play a role in redemptive history this summer. Just really practically. I call them the "I"'s of my gospel evangelism. Here's how you can play a role in redemptive history. How about this? Just be intentional. Be intentional when you're at the pool.

Be intentional when you're on vacation with the server. When you're on the road trip, just be intentional.

Second, be interested. There are so many hurting people that God is going to put in your life if you're just looking for them. I have a story that I could tell right now, but I think I only have about 22 minutes left, so I got to keep going. But it's briefly this a woman went up to my wife at the gym and just kind of pouredher heart out, and my wife started having conversations and invited her to church. Two weeks later, her husband took his own life. People are talking to you for a reason. Be interested. 

Be invested. Don't just invite them to your church. Invite them into your home this summer. How about that? Find a way. Don'tlead with..do you want to come to my church? Lead with this. Do you want to come to my house and have a barbecue?

Be inconvenienced. You will be inconvenienced if you'reserious about being a witness and then. 

Be interceding. That's the most important. Be prayerful. Be prayerful. Be prayerful. The greatest messenger shows every messenger the way to live is a messenger. Remember your role in redemptive history.

Number two, if I want to be a messenger in my city, the second must for every messenger, 

I must share my story with gospel humility.

John's bold preaching created a stir. John Wesley said this light yourself on fire with passion, and people will come from miles to watch you burn. And listen, people, this is John's story right here. John was a bold, passionate, fiery preacher. People were coming from everywhere. The scripture say they were coming from Jerusalem. They were coming from Judea. They were coming from around the Jordan. Everybody is listening to him. And people wanted to hear this man, John, because here's the reality. When a person speaks with conviction, it doesn't matter as to whether or not they even agree with you. But if you have a convictional belief system in this day and age, and even in John's day and age, like people just want to hear it. So. So what'ssuper interesting...to God be the glory. There's this guy who'scoming to our church. I don't even know if you guys know this. His name is Matt Shin. Remember Matt? Like, he's a single guy. He's late 20s. He was more faithful than any church member. He was on the parking team. Matt came to our church, grew up Roman Catholic, became an agnostic, and he'd come every week. Matt tells me he's moving back to New Hampshire. So I'ma little bit discouraged because he had been coming at this point for like four years. He's moving back to New Hampshire, still hasn't become a believer. And I'm like, what in the world? Like the gospel is supposed to be an offense. I mean, am I not? Like it was super convicting. Like, what is going on? Am I the problem? Am I the problem? You ever feel that way, Adam, when you're like, they're not getting it. Like, I don't want to preach this gospel message. And he's here every week. Is it me? And I'm like, Matt, we got to meet. And I'm like, Matt, help me understand. Why would you come to our church week after week after week after week, and yet you don't believe any of this stuff. And this is what he said. It's because when I'm in your home and I

watch your life, and when I hear you preach, I know you actually believe it and live it. So I would come. Fast forward a year. Fast forward to this past Easter. We just baptized them. Finally came to know Christ. Took over five years sitting in the seats. People loving him, serving him, pointing him to the scriptures. Don't buy into the lie that people don't want to hear people with conviction. And the Jews were wanting to hear from John the Baptist, because for 400 years there was no prophetic word and they knew what was next. They are waiting with anticipation for the arrival of the Messiah, and they are thinking, maybe this is the guy. Maybe, maybe he's the Messiah. So when the religious leaders heard about the huge crowd that John the Baptist was attracting, if you look down at verse 19. Verse 19 says, they sent out the priests and the Levites to investigate...the religious leaders probably being the Sanhedrin. It says Jews. The Jewish leaders, they finally get to JB and it was it was probably a little bit of a letdown because they're hearing about this great preaching guy and this massive crowd. This is how I read the Bible, so I apologize. It's kind of like the Chosen. I use my imagination. Okay. Some of you, it's just kind of making its way back there. People are chuckling. They finally get to him. It's a little bit of a letdown because the guy's like munching on locusts. He's wearing camel's hair. This is the guy? And notice it's kind of like when it says, who are you? It's kind of like, who are you? That's how I imagine it. Who are you? And John knows what they're thinking, so he cuts them off. He's like, I am not the Christ. And then they're thinking, alright, he's not the Messiah. This guy's weird...Elijah was weird. They have the same wardrobe. And so the Jews, of course, they were anticipating Elijah's revival. They were anticipating a literal person. Malachi chapter four, verse five. Elijah would come back in the preparation of the king's arrival. And of course, they misunderstood the prophecy because it wasn't talking about a literal person, it was talking about a person in the spirit of Elijah. I think it's Luke one verse 35 that says that. And so they're like, all right, are you Elijah? Verse 21. And John's like, I'm not. Now they're really confused. So again, I imagine them kind of like, all right guys, huddle up, huddle up. Because it's Levites and priests, right, right, right. All right, come together. Huddle, huddle. Picture a football huddle. Here we go. What are we going to ask next? So verse 21, are you the prophet? Do you ever get to that point when people keep asking you questionsand you start getting annoyed? So your answer becomes shorter and shorter and shorter. That's John right here. Are you the prophet? No. But these three questions by the priests and Levites, they're based upon a wrong understanding of Scripture. In Deuteronomy chapter 18, verses 15 through 18, Moses promised a prophet like him who would come and deliver God's people. And when Jesus came on the scene, the Jews were once again looking for a political figure who would deliver them from Roman oppression and Roman tyranny. So at this point, the confusion has turned to frustration. He's definitely not what they were hoping him to be. And now they have to go back to the Sanhedrin with some answers and they've got nothing. So look at verse 22, the priests and Levites, they're ticked. So they said to him...and I envision them being a little bit angry right now, like, like, so who are you? Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself? Like that's what I think the tone would probably have been. But notice what John doesn't say when these religious leaders ask John why he's baptizing if he isn't any of these three people. He doesn't say, you know, hey guys, I'm the guy that people 2000years from now will be talking about me. Or I'm the guy who, an angel descended from heaven to announce my life and prophesy about the impact of my ministry. I'm the guy with the supernatural birth. I'm the guy that Jesus speaks about in Luke chapter seven, verse 28, when Jesus is going to eventually say no one is greater. He deflects. And when the greatest man ever to be born of a woman and a man. Obviously Jesus is the greatest ever born of a woman, but I mean a man and a woman...natural birth, not miraculous like our Savior who was born of a virgin. When the greatest man ever to be born is askedwhy he's baptizing, he deflects all the attention off of himself and he puts it directly on Christ. We already read it, but look at it again, he says in verse 23, he says, I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord as the prophet Isaiah said.

All right, I have a question for you. Can you see a voice? Can you see a voice? No. What's going on here is John's deflecting all the attention off himself. And he's saying, guys, I'm nothing. Look at what he goes on to say in verse 26 after they ask him why he's baptizing if he's not Christ, Elijah or Moses. Verse 26, John answered them, I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know. Even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. So as John's sharing his story in his ministry and his testimony, he's making it clear that there's only one guy that's worthy of glory...Jesus. He's like, I'mnot even qualified to be at Jesus feet, untying his sandal. And that's a significant statement because remember the culture. Remember that culture of foot washing? I mean, that was a nasty job. I mean, fast forward to the Last Supper. Remember the last Supper? Who ends up washing the feet? Jesus. Why was Jesus washing the feet? Because nobody else wanted to do it. It was a terrible, nasty job. And as my sister just said, he was a servant. So Jesus gets up and he washes the feet. But nobody wanted to do that. It was the job of the lowest servant. And here's the greatest man to ever live apart from Jesus, the one who Jesus literally calls the GOAT, the greatest of all time. And he's letting these religious leaders who are trying to make him into something, know that he's not even worthy to be the lowest servant of the Messiah. That's his story. It's not about his ministry accomplishments. Not about his prominent position. That's not what he wants to declare. That's not what he wants to be known by. John is all about Jesus. He just wants to testify about Jesus. And when we witness loved ones, our story must be all about Jesus and His glory. When sharing your testimony, Jesus always has to be the hero. When sharing why you live a life that is fully devoted to living for Christ and making Jesus famous, make Jesus the hero. Echo the words of John in verse 26...I am just a nobody. I am totally unworthy. But I got lucky. God gave me grace. He called me. He saved me. He chose me. He set me apart to speak of him. John is showing every messenger how to live as a messenger...not by being impressive, but by being invisible. That's John's point. Not by making muchof yourself, but by making much of Jesus. So how do we share our story then, with that kind of gospel humility? Let me give you a simple acronym to help you craft a Christ centered testimony. I'm just trying to give you tools for the summer. Here's a simple acronym. You can take a you can take a picture if you'd like. We're going to just kind of cruise through it as we're coming to an end here. I've got a third point, but how to craft your story with gospel humility.

Just be convictional start with being convictional...be convictional as John was. It's going to draw a crowd. People are going to want to listen, speak with truth and confidence.

Then second, be relational or be relatable. Don't be weird like John the Baptist. Connect to where people actually are in their life. Look for those connect points.

Be Authentic. Don't fake it...be you. People are interested in you because you are you? Be authentic. You don't have to be somebody else. 

Just be faithful. Humble people will always keep the spotlight on Jesus. Be faithful to the Word of God. Be faithful to the message of God. John said nine words. Jonah said seven words. Just be faithful to gospel fidelity.

And then last but not least, be transparent. Be transparent about your story. Here's where I was, and here's what God did. And now this is who I am. And it's not because of me. It'sbecause of what he did in me. And I want you to experience that same thing with me.

The greatest messenger shows every messenger how to live as a messenger. If I want to be a messenger in my city, I must remember my role in redemptive history. Second, I must share my story with gospel humility. And then last but not least,

I must showcase my Savior with evangelistic urgency.

I remember the first time I ever get a trophy. Man, I wanted that thing on the dining room table. My mom's like, get that out of here. I remember, I remember the first time I ever wore my baseball uniform. Remember the first time you ever put on your baseball uniform like, dad, do you want to go to the grocery store or something? Why? Because we want to show it off. We want to showcase it. We want to point it out. We want to prop it up. We want to promote it most. We want everybody to know about it. But what I love about John is he just wants to showcaseone thing. He just wants to showcase the Savior, and he wants to do it with urgency because he doesn't know if this is his last chance. And the first thing he does as he showcases the Savior, look at verse 29, It says, the next day he basically he points Jesus out. He's like, look at that guy. Verse 29, the next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. Meaning all the attention was off of him and onto Jesus. He's deflecting. He'slike, man, you people are coming from miles to hear me. He'sthe Lamb of God. He's the one that the lamb in our in our Jewish history, the Lamb of God, the sacrificial lamb that started in Exodus that we all know about because many of these people were religious people. He's the Lamb of God. He's the fulfillment. He's the one we've been waiting for. He's the one who can atone for sin. He's the one who can give you hope. He'sthe one who can set you free. He's the one who can give youlife. He is the spotless one. He is the sinless one. He's the lamb. He points him out.

And then look at verse 30. He doesn't just point Jesus out. He props him up. He's like, this is he of whom I said, after me comes a man who ranks before me because he was before me. Basically, John's like, you guys were asking me a lot ofquestions yesterday. This is the guy. Look at the text. He is eternal. He's before me. He is ahead of me. He ranks above me. He is whom I said. He is the promised one. He is the fulfillment of prophecy. John is just. He's. He's pointing him out. He'spropping him up, and then he promotes him most. Verses 31 through 34, I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water that he might be revealed to Israel. John is basically saying, my ministry only exists to make him known. Verse 32, and John bore witness, I saw the spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him. But he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, he on whom you see the spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit. Basically, what's going on here is John is declaring that Jesus is the one who is anointed by the spirit. He's a fulfillment of the messianic prophecy of Isaiah, chapter 11, Isaiah 42. He is the fulfillment of prophecy. And what he's doing is he's contrasting his water baptism with Jesusspirit baptism, and he's basically showing Jesus superior power.

Now look at verse 34. He says, and I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God. I mean, this is the highest possible promotion that John could give Jesus. He's publicly affirming Jesus divinity. He's not just a great teacher. He's not just a prophet. This is God's son who came to save the world. And then he ends in verses 35 to 37. And he puts him first, says, the next day, again John was standing with two of his disciples. So now is the third day. And he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, behold, the Lamb of God. The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. Once again, John's not promoting himself. He's saying, look at him. It's almost like he'ssaying, get your eyes off of me. Stop looking at me. Stop! Stop following me. I don't want this crowd. Know him. Follow him.

When we come to a passage of Scripture like this, I think it'ssuper, super important that we recall the words of James. Remember, James? James chapter one says the word of God...it'slike a what? It's like a mirror, isn't it? It's like a mirror, and we'reable to look at it and we're able to kind of see where we are. And so right now, as Steven comes, I just want us to take a moment to just bow our heads and close our eyes and, and take a moment to just have a time of reflection. And there are just four questions that I'm going to ask and I'd want you to think about.

And the first question is probably the most important question. The first question is this do you have a story? Meaning, do you have a gospel story? Have you come to the place in your spiritual life where you have recognized that you are a sinner and your sin has separated you from a holy God, and that sin will not allow you in that holy God's presence. And have you come to the point where you have confessed that sin. And not just confessed it, but you have repented of it. You've called upon the Lord to not just be your Savior who would pay for that sin, but to also be the Lord of your life. So that song that we sung about earlier, Yes I will. And you'll place the Lord over your own life. Have you done that? You can't share the story of Jesus until you first have a story. And so if you have never done that, I know there are elders. There are people with lanyards. They'rewearing name badges. If you have never done this, they would love to show you how you can have your own story, how you can share your gospel story.

And for those of us who are already believers in the room, the question is simply this are you playing a role in redemptive history? Listen, here's the reality Jesus plan is moving forwardand he doesn't need you and me. It's going to happen. It's going to happen. He's building a kingdom and it's going to live forever. But I don't know about you, but I kind of, by God's grace, I kind of want to play a part in that building of his kingdom, and he'scommissioned us to do that. So right now, just ask the Lord. Lord, am I playing a role in redemptive history? And if not, just talk to the Lord and say, Lord, I want to recommit myself to playing a role in redemptive history. Will you lead me to somepeople this summer that I can point to Christ, who's my one that I will focus in on this summer?

Third question is simply this. What are you most passionateabout? This is the one that really got me. There's a lot of things that I'm passionate about. I'm passionate about my kids. I like to brag on them. I'm passionate about what God's doing at my church. But are you most passionate about Christ the way John the Baptist was.

And last but not least, who around you needs to hear the message this summer? Let's take a moment right now. Let's bow our heads. Let's close our eyes. Lord, who's the person that needs to hear this summer from me? Talk to the Lord and we'regoing to transition to a time of worship in a moment.

Lord, it is awesome to think that we too are messengers, just like John the Baptist. We have been commissioned by you to proclaim about your son. And Jesus, we know that you are King of Kings. You are Lord of lords. Your kingdom will be built, but we want to be a part of it, and so help us to be invested this summer. Help us to be intentional this summer. Help us to be interceding for the people that you place in our life this summer, so that we might be able to play a role in redemptive history not for our glory, but for your glory. We want your fame to be known in this city. We want those statistics that we saw this morning. We want to see them changed. We want to see those 25% that don't believe we wanted to we want to move the needle. We want to pray in faith that you can stir a revival in Hickory, North Carolina, through this local church. Lord, we need to pray in faith that you can do that. And so, Lord, will you give us a heart for the lost? Will you give us a passion for Christ? Will you mold us? Will you break us more into the image of the suffering servant?...so that when people see us, they see your glory, and it's in your name we pray. Amen.

The Dusk of a King-Maker

Pastor Adam Ashoff

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The Road to Spiritual Renewal

Pastor Adam Ashoff

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The Road Spiritual Renewal

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Good morning, brothers and sisters. Please turn to 1 Samuel chapter 7. If you have just been here visiting maybe for a few weeks, you may feel today like you're just jumping into the middle of a story or a movie or something like that, and the characters might not be familiar. So since we've been out of Samuel just a couple of weeks, I will try to kind of catch us back up today as we get back into it, and where we are in this wonderful book. As the title of the book, you might guess is about a person named Samuel, and that's understandable. And yet we've said the title really doesn't do it justice. The name Samuel, because the name, even though it sounded like God has heard me. The name itself meant God is my name, and God is the hero of the whole story of Samuel, because it is God who is moving along Salvation in the people of God in Israel all the way to Christ coming the greater prophet, the greatest prophet, the greatest king, the greatest priest that the people of God will ever know. And so Samuel is an important book for understanding just the flow of Scripture, of how God establishes kingship in Israel. Prior to that. Uh, God ruled and reigned himself through his law, and he rose up Levites and priests to offer sacrifices for the people. He rose up prophets like Moses and others to speak to the people, but they never had a king. He rose up judges like Joshua and Samson and Gideon, those who could, uh, keep the peace, if you will. But they never had a king. They never had somebody that. I guess when we think about a king, somebody with absolute power, if you want to call it that. And, this is the book that that changes from a theocracy where God is king over all the people, to that of having a king, an autocracy. And that's where we are getting to in this book. And Samuel is the one that ushers that in. He is the one that is going to anoint Saul, and he's going to anoint David starting in chapter 9 and onward. But for the next two weeks, while we're still in the month of May, we'll finish out 1 Samuel seven today and then eight next week before we take a break for the one service summer and have a guest speaker in here. First week in June, a guy that we've partnered with before, Matt McCarthy of City Light Church in High Point. We helped support that church as it was planted. And then after that, the leadership will do a series on the attributes of God through the month of June, July and into August. And then, Lord willing, and the creek don't rise, we'll be back in Samuel in the month of August and onward. So it's going to hopefully end where we see in the next two weeks, right up to the point where Saul comes around. And these two weeks we actually get the the most attention given to Samuel in his heyday, if you will. So far, we've really just seen Samuel as a young man. We've kind of seen his origins story, but he disappeared off the scene a few weeks ago. Maybe you noticed that chapters four, five and six, he was gone. He was nowhere to be found. Even though we'll see in the text today that he was heard, that though the Word of God had been silent, it says in 1 Samuel four that that there was not there was not a word from the Lord. Sorry. In first Samuel 3:1 as Samuel was just a boy learning under Eli, the Word of the Lord was rare in those days. By the time we get to the end of chapter three, Samuel has grown up from adolescence to a man of God in chapter three, verses 19 to 21. And eventually Eli's going to be off the scene as he is kind of diminishing both physically, but more so his leadership as the priest in Shiloh. And so a transition occurs in the Book of Samuel from Eli's leadership to Samuel's leadership. But yet, as chapter four started out, though the Word of God was coming to Samuel. And it says in first Samuel four one and thus the word of Samuel was coming to all Israel. It's just like that. He's gone. And you would almost expect that. Well, if God is speaking to Samuel and all of Samuel's words are going out to all of Israel, he would have a pretty pronounced role from that point forward. Except that wasn't part of God's plan for Israel to really hit rock bottom, as we have seen in chapters four, five, and six. That he suffered the humiliation of his own apparent defeat, the Ark being taken, Israel being defeated to teach Israel a most important lesson, which is that his glory, his presence with his people, was not going to be confined or localized to the Ark, so that they would actually, over the course of time, have come to put their faith in an ark, in a, in a talisman and a rabbit's foot in a piece of furniture, a really nice one at that. They had lost sight that their hope, their salvation, their deliverance was in God Himself, and they had drifted from that. And so we don't hear from Samuel starting back in first Samuel 4:2 all the way until he comes on the scene today. And he's probably now a mature spiritual man in his 30s. We know from the Levitical law that it wasn't until 25 that a priest could enter into the priesthood, though he was in the Levitical line. Age 25 is when his apprenticeship would start, and then it was usually by age 30 that he would serve in that function. And so years have gone by. And now Eli, is that priest or sorry, Eli is dead. Um, and Samuel is that priest. And it's been 20 years, and Samuel is now doing what he's always done. He's had a word from God, and he's spoken it. But nobody's been listening until we get to chapter seven. The judgment on Israel's rejection of his word has been severe. They were conquered by the Philistines starting back in chapter four. But then it wasn't just severity to Israel, it was to the Philistines. Chapters five and six. As God was showing his sovereignty over the false god of the Philistines, Dagon, he brought curses upon the Philistines in their land to the point that in chapter six they decide to get rid of the Ark and send it back to Israel. And that's where we pick up today in chapter seven, in a little dot on the map called Kiriath-Jearim, a little border town between the Philistines and the Israelites. Nothing significant about this place, and really nothing significant about the people there. Abinadab whose house? It was his son Eleazar, who was tasked to keep the Ark. All insignificant characters, but showing that during this 20 years of darkness, God was working, Samuel was preaching, and it was going to take a while for that preaching to get through to the people, to the point we'll see in the text today where they get back on the road to spiritual renewal. That's what this chapter is about. Israel was in rebellion. The Philistines were licking their wounds. But God is still teaching this lesson. You don't need to get right with a place Shiloh or an Ark, a piece of furniture, or even a person. Eli who has passed off the scene. Or now, Samuel, you need to know God is my name and to get back on the road to spiritual renewal starts with getting right with me. That's where we pick up the story today.  
So follow along as I read 1 Samuel 7, I'll read the first three verses, and then we will walk along the road to renewal the rest of the way. And the men of Kiriath Jearim came and took the ark of the Lord, and brought it into the house of Abinadab on the hill, and consecrated Eleazar his son to keep the Ark of the Lord. From the day that the ark remained at Kiriath Jearim. The time was long. It was 20 years, and all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord. Then Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, if you return to the Lord with all your heart, remove the foreign gods and the Ashtaroth from among you, and direct your hearts to the Lord, and serve him alone, and he will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the Word of our God endures and renews us even right now.

 

If you read your Bible regularly, you will see a familiar concept. I would argue from cover to cover, and that would be the concept that the Christian life, the life of a person of faith, is a way or referred to as a path or a road. Psalm 1. My favorite psalm I call the Sentinel Psalm because it stands at the beginning of the Psalter, the songbook of the people of God. And at the gates, Psalm 1 stands and says, if you are going to enter into worship of God, which is what the Psalter is there for. If you're going to enter into these gates, you only can take one of two paths. Someone says there's a path of the wicked, and there's a path of the righteous, and those are the only two options. And to the time of John the Baptist. Preparing the what? The way of the Lord, as he was calling the people to repentance in faith. The Messiah is coming into the time of Christ himself. What did he tell people to do? He said to repent and believe and follow me. Be a learner of what I teach. Be a follower of how I live. And then even into the book of Acts, the early church. Before the people were even known as Christians, they were called followers of the way. Used five times in the book of Acts. This theme of the life of faith, of a person of God, a child of God, a disciple of Jesus is referred to as a way or a path or a road. That idea is clear. And that idea embodies both truths you believe that's part of the way, but also practices for how you're to behave, its doctrine and its duty. It's what we say we believe with our mind and heart and soul, but it's seen. It's identifiable on the outside in our actions. It's both of those and that that lifestyle of both what we say we believe and how we behave is what really then encompasses the way of the righteous, the narrow path, Jesus says, that leads to eternal life in him versus the wide road that leads to destruction. And today, the road to spiritual renewal reminds us that all God's people at all times are on a path either following that path wholeheartedly from the inside, but yes, traceable by our steps on the outside in obedience to him. Or we start ever so slightly to do what? Veer to the right, or veer to the left, or sometimes in a state of true rebellion, we just turn and go the opposite direction. But, the call to be a follower of Christ and the fruit that he accompanies a child of God truly is to follow the way to stay on the path. And we'll see today from the inside is where it begins. And when you see yourself even this morning, when you feel like or it seems like or you sense that you have departed from that path, you have to ask yourself, what do I do? How do I get back on the path? In fact, some of you in here might sense that you have lost a relationship with God. He feels distant. He feels silent. You don't know how to hear him anymore. Maybe one way to illustrate that would be to say I feel like I'm lost. I'm talking to Christians. If you're not in Christ today, you're lost. The Bible refers to you as lost, but I'm talking to people in a church who can go through a real experience of feeling like they have lost the way, and they don't know how to get back on the path. In today's text is a story. It's a description of what it looked like, not just for one person. An entire nation of people to get back on the road to spiritual renewal. Maybe we would call that in our time and age, a revival, if you will. The question is how to do it. Well, if that's where your mind is today, you're in, I was I was going to say good company, but actually you're in bad company to start. Because Israel was not following God. They had rebelled against him. They had forsaken the way. They were finding their own way. They were doing, as the book of Judges overlaps into the beginning of Samuel, what was right in their own eyes. But there is good news here in the not good company of Israel, because the road to renewal today, for you and for me, is not an unknown course. It's not a hidden path. Praise God for that. He doesn't try to hide it and disguise it to where you're wandering off in the wilderness, so to speak. You're getting. You're getting lost. And it's getting dark and you don't know where to go. There is a light that you can follow, and the light is the truth of the Word of God, a light unto your path today. So that is the hope any of you have today. If you feel lost, maybe it's been some time. God calls out to you today through his perfect word to get back on the road.  
So where do you start? Well, part 1...point 1 is the road to spiritual renewal. Always, always, always starts with repentance before God. That's the first movement of this text that teaches us how to get back on that road. The road to spiritual renewal starts with repentance. And you may say what Adam reminded me, what does repentance mean? Well, it's a word for turning in the Old Testament. A very simple word to turn. You could probably put two and two together, right? To turn away from whatever path you are on, whatever sin you were following, whatever desires of your own heart, and turn to God. In the New Testament, it's a term related to a change of mind, as in you're thinking was this way and now it's going to be that way. And both of those represent repentance. The way back to the road, you do need to change directions, metaphorically speaking, but it is a change of mind, isn't it? I mean, right now, what is the Word of God attempting to do to you right now? It's the truth of God, and it's meant to convict you. It's meant to prick your conscience. Or if you are so far gone, pummel your conscience to wake you up from whatever slumber you've been in. So you go, wait, I. I need a change of mind. I don't know what I've been thinking. So first and foremost would start with that. The preaching of the Word of God is meant to get to your heart, but it does go through your mind. You hear it, and you have to sit under it and say, is this true or is it not? But not just evaluate. Is it true or is it not? Is it true or is it not towards me, the listener? Is God speaking to me? And he is, because you're under the authority of His Word. That is repentance. That is the basic picture of repentance in the Bible. And we're going to see it fleshed out in in three ways, described in this first section of verses 1 to 7.
So let's pick up the story the road to Spiritual renewal. First, Israel was lost. We said that verses one and two, the ark is in some podunk town in Israel, on the border with the Philistines, but nobody wants to go near it for 20 years. It says, verse two, it's been in the house of Abinadab. They consecrated his son Eleazar, who his name does mean God is my help and he is there to protect the Ark because they still have some respect for it. But yet there's no reverence that leads them to say, in 20 years, maybe we should think about restoring it. Nobody does that. Maybe it's indifference. Maybe it's fear. We don't know. But sometime in that 20 years where it's sitting there and ignored and Kiriath Jearim, the time was long, the writer says. 20 years. And yet at the end of this time, there's a pulse on Israel. What does it say? All the house of Israel lamented after the Ark. Is that what it says? They limited after Shiloh. They missed Eli. No. The reason we know this isn't crocodile tears. This isn't pseudo repentance because it says in the text they grieve. They were sorrowful after Yahweh. That's something only God can do. They missed God on this path that they had been on, lost for 20 years and more. They started to miss God again. They missed him personally. They didn't miss the Ark. They missed God. They grieved that they had lost a relationship with him. Why are they interested now? We don't know. It could be, humanly speaking, that the faithfulness for the last 20 years, when we last left off with Samuel at the end of chapter three, when the Lord is revealing himself to Samuel by the word of the Lord, and the word of Samuel is going to all Israel, all the while all this action is happening in chapters four, five, and six, with war and destruction and the Ark stolen, and it destroying the Philistines and it coming back. All the while there's Samuel behind the scenes in obscurity, being faithful with the Word of God. Nobody's listening. But his word doesn't return void, does it? It's being planted, and he just keeps doing what he was called to do in obscurity. He's not in the limelight. He's in the shadows. But now he steps on the scene because there's what appears to be a heart of godly sorrow, not worldly sorrow. It doesn't say Israel was just lamenting because they were losers. They were under subjection to the Philistines. It says they were sorry because they missed God. So what was Samuel's message? In the silence. He spoke to all of Israel, saying, if this is real. If with all your heart this is real, this is on the inside. This is in your gut gnawing at you. You miss God. You grieve the loss of a relationship with him. You are God's covenant people and you have no idea what that looks like anymore. If from your heart you want to return to the Lord, you're going to do these things. That's repentance. If it's real, Israel. And if it's real for you today, if you're sitting there and you're like, you know, it's been 20 years for me. Maybe you're a fellow Gen Xer like myself and you peaked in your faith 20 years ago. Your 20s were great. You were on fire for the Lord. You were in college. You were part of some fellowship. It was alive. It was active. It was amazing. But it's been quiet. That can happen. It could be five years ago. I don't know how long that silence is, but you know it, don't you? You know what it's like to feel distant from God And the problem with Israel up until this point is they had localized a relationship with God. What do I mean by that? They had thought it was at the Ark, or it was back then, or it was in the good old days. We do the same. We think, oh, it was if I could just get back to where I was in 2005, I was at Grace Community Church. Personal reformation for me, discovering expository preaching under John MacArthur. Oh, it's was I alive and on fire then? If I can only get back there. We don't get back anywhere. It's over. The fruit remains. Praise God. We don't live in the past in our faith, but we do live out of it, my friend. And if that faith is real, if it was not just a facade. If it was not just putting your hope localized in a person or a church or an experience. But if it was the real thing, that's what you long for. God. But you could easily misinterpret and think it was the preacher and think it was the place and the time. And so you're just blown back and forth, trying to grasp at something, to find that meaning, to find that reality. And you try all these different things and you're trying everything but God. It's him you want, isn't it? But when you localize, that's what Israel had done. And so he let them come. They'd be broken down to very nothing. They have nothing except the Word of the Lord that now has pricked their conscience and moved their hearts. And Samuel comes and says, oh, if this is real in you, if with all your heart, because that's what God wants from you. He's always wanted that Israel. Deuteronomy 6:4-5. Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one, and you are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. That's what a relationship with God is, and you've lost it. So if you want that back. If you want back on the road to spiritual renewal, this is what repentance turning back to him is going to look like. Three things. Remove the foreign gods. Direct your hearts to the Lord and serve him alone. Now I want you to be careful with that because I'm not giving you a prescription for repentance. I'm describing what happened then and there, and the effect of it, we will see, was legitimate. It describes in that time and in that place what Samuel, who received the word from God and spoke it to them, what he said. Israel, if you want back on this road to renewal, if you want revival in your own heart and as a nation, here's some things you're going to need to do. And here's some things we all need to consider because we could be anywhere in the scope of this. But we trust that the Spirit of God can speak to your heart this morning. What does repentance look like? The first thing it looks like is turning from sin. That's what I interpret. Remove the foreign gods and the Ashtaroth from among you. It's turning from sin. It's turning from idols of the heart. Now in their time, they were real idols. We don't have the same today. Maybe you do. As in, over the course of your spiritual journey, you've, you know, kind of gotten bored with Christianity and checked out other faiths, false gods, not the real thing. So there's a there's a general call here to remove the foreign gods, as in, did you forget commandment number one Israel, Exodus 23. You shall have what? No other gods before me, in front of me. In front of me? Not so much, I think. Order of. Okay. One, two. No, it's just you and me. That's a relationship. You love me with everything in you. Nothing gets between us before me. And you've let something get before me. That's how we can be the same as them, can't we? We let something get between us and God, steals our heart away from him. Steals our heart. It's not merely a hobby. It's not merely an interest. It's not merely. It's stealing your heart. It's getting in there, and it's getting between you and God. And you have to remove it. To repent is to turn to God. Is is to say, I've got to deal with this sin that is keeping me from a relationship with God. Because he demands my absolute allegiance to him and affection for him. That's all wrapped up in that call in Deuteronomy 6:4-5. Complete allegiance to him. Hear, O Israel, I am the one God, the one true God. But he also wants your total affection, doesn't he? All your heart, all your mind, all your strength. He wants all of you. What else would a loving God want? A jealous God want some of you? What do you want from your spouse? Some of their affection or all of it? I'm just okay with some of my spouse's affection. I don't need it all you want all of it? Anything less than that we call adultery. Some other person gets in between. You know, that was the word God used in the Old Testament spiritual adultery. When Israel went after what? Foreign gods and in the spirit of the age. Then it happened in Israel's time, going after other God's Book of judges into this time. It happens today. The spirit of the age. You know, there's a lot of different ways. We're all on a journey, right? From the lips of what some call in the secular media, the the head of the church of Christendom, Pope Francis, now dead, said this years ago, Pope Francis representing Christendom again in the eyes of the media, all religions are paths to God. God is for everyone. Therefore we are all God's children. But my God is more important than yours. Is this true? There is one God and religions are like languages. Paths to reach God. Some Sikh, some Muslim, some Hindu, some Christian. That's the spirit of the age. There's multiple ways. Either way, you're going to be fine. In the end. You have to what remove, at least in your thinking, a change of mind? That's not true because Jesus demanded ultimate allegiance, the exclusive path to him, the way, the truth and the life. It's strictly from the Bible. There's no messing with it but a Pope who, so to speak, speaks for the church has greater authority than the Bible can say something as heretical as that. Never removed from his office. That's the first step back to God. It's a change of mind in repentance that you can't have any gods before him. But look at the next thing they were to do in this turning from sin, this removing the foreign gods. He gets specific. He calls out Ashtaroth, who was a fertility goddess, Baal's wife. We meet her back in the beginning of the book of Judges in chapter two, verse 13. And Samuel not only calls out the general rejection of any false gods, any other gods, he knows something about these people. Maybe he's watched it for two decades. Go on. Corrupted religious practice that was associated with Ashtaroth had to do with sexual immorality, cult practices that linked ecstasy and religion and pleasure. And it was a particular curse. It was a plague on Israel. And he called it out because that's what repentance does. It's not okay to just be vague, you know, just you just got to you got to walk away from sin. It's what are the sins that are keeping you from God? What specific sins? Ashtaroth is named because it, according to Samuel, was their best beloved idol that they were wedded to. And as Matthew Henry writes about this, true repentance strikes at our darling sins. You ever call your sins a darling sin, the kind you love that you don't want to let go of? And he says, true repentance will strike at darling sins with a particular zeal and resolution to put away that sin which most easily besets us. So repentance that leads to spiritual renewal starts with seeing your sin more clearly and feeling the guilt of it, and rejecting the gods of our age that get into our mind, but also the idols of our age that work their way into our hearts. And I don't know what those are for you. If it's the great grandchildren of Ashtaroth, they could be the gods of sexual immorality. They are for many. The things we let our eyes see, the jokes we find appealing, the crude, the filth, pornography, living together, not married and just thinking those things that are clearly outlawed in Scripture I'm okay with. It's the great grandchildren of this false goddess that says, I can have my pleasure and God at the same time. And he says, no, I demand total allegiance to me, and I want all of your affection. So turn. Now, in that turning, we get to the next one. You direct your heart to the Lord. This is repentance described because repentance is turning from sin, which we just covered. And what, as you turn from sin, who do you turn to? You turn to God. You just don't turn to nothing. I mean, some people do that. They want to clean up their act. Maybe they see the consequences of their sin and they're convinced, I can't keep doing this. It's ruining my life. I'm getting fired from my job. Uh, it's estranging me from my family. I'm going to get kicked out of the house. Um, so they turn from sin, but they don't turn to God. They don't direct their heart to God. And we must. We must, or else something else will come in and do even worse damage, whether that be legalism. Now I'm just going to clean up my act and earn my way to some righteous path or just further libertinism which is I got rid of that sin. But now. Hey, that's not I got that. Let me try this other one here. So you turn from sin, you remove these false gods, these idols of the heart, and you turn and direct your heart to God. This is all in the heart, in repentance. It's heart work this morning. It's not merely to remove the sin, it's to seek the Lord. Pursue him again. 200 years ago, famous Christian dead guy Puritan Thomas Chalmers wrote a powerful defense of this truth in an essay called The Expulsive Power of a New Affection. And this was his thesis. Such is the grasping tendency of the human heart that it must have something to lay hold of, and which, if wrested away without the substitution of another something in its place, would leave a void and a vacancy as painful to the mind as hunger is to the natural system. That's essentially what's being described here. You can try to turn from a sin and remove an idol, but if you do not direct your heart to God, Israel, something else will fill that void. Because we read in the scriptures, God has made us in his image, designed us for relationship with him, put eternity in our hearts. And you cannot just say, I'm going to remove this, this thing from my heart. I'm going to bear down and get rid of that sin because I see its consequences, and I don't like them, and I'm busted. And I'm sorry about getting busted. But if you don't direct your heart to the Lord, you've made no progress. You've got to direct your heart to the Lord. Chalmers was saying that if you're not going to continue to love the world and its sinful pleasures, you need to fill it with a love for God and His joys that he alone can give. Otherwise, you'll be back where you  started, and maybe worse off. The expulsive as in you can move this thing out with a greater affection. Parents were challenged to do this with our kids and their appetites. That's how I'm going to translate Puritan language into modern terms. Your kid wants to eat candy all the time. Ice cream on top of ice cream, gummy bears, chocolate syrup. You go to that sweet frog place. Gross stuff like sweet things that go together. Chocolate syrup and M&Ms. Sour candy and fruit. And my kids love it. If I just say, hey, no, I'm not going to just let you live off of sugar, but they're actually hungry. What do I need to do? I've got to feed them something. Broccoli. Usually doesn't work. Barbecue chicken, pulled pork, a steak, if they're lucky. Because they're hungry and hungry people will eat. You'll find something to eat, won't you? And when you drift from God, when you go on another path, what are you doing other than saying, I was hungry and I followed my appetite because he wasn't enough. So you remove the bad thing you shouldn't be eating. It's not good for you, but you got to fill it and feed yourself with something that will satisfy. How does Christ describe discovering the kingdom of heaven? It's like a guy who he goes out searching for this one thing, for this one pearl, and he finds a better one and a bigger one, and he goes all in for it. He sells everything he has for that one. That's finding Christ the greatest joy you'll ever find. We can drift. We could forget how good it is to taste and see the goodness of the Lord. So he calls us back from the heart. Those really are the inside work. And then the thing you would see for sure on the outside, this last piece of it, is it moves the will to action. It goes from this mindset change. That is right. I can't go on living for these things of the world. I must turn from them. I must direct my heart to the Lord. And then from that good, good root produces this third thing serve him alone. Get after it. It moves your will to action. You want to worship him. You want to serve him. You want to live for him. And you're satisfied in that. That's the path back. Now, again, I said, I didn't want to try to make this some formulaic thing. So, Adam, can you just lay out these steps today? I first have to remove the idols, and then I have to direct my heart. And then now give me six things to do to serve the God. Maybe it could work that way. Or maybe just in this moment of hearing the Word of God and your mind being convinced you're on the wrong path and you need to turn back. That's just it. And automatically the Spirit is convicting you of the sins that you need to repent of and confess and find forgiveness and healing, and let God then lead you to what? Where can I serve you, Lord? How can I serve you? He can do that for you right now. That's the path back. That's turning back to him. A change of mind about our sin, a change of heart in our desires and the fruit of good works. Service to God from a transformed mind and heart. Heart work on the inside. Removing those idols of the heart. Directing our heart towards the Lord. But on the outside serving him. You see it, otherwise it just doesn't add up, right? It's all lip service. We can say, oh, yeah, I'm convinced of that. I have a change of mind. It got me thinking this week about an article I read about a change of mind. Uh, this summer is the 50th anniversary of cinematic masterpiece known as Jaws. And the headline as I'm thinking about repentance and change of mind, the headline read Man Attempting to swim around Martha's Vineyard where Jaws was filmed, hopes to change minds about sharks. An endurance athlete is hoping to change minds about sharks by swimming around Martha's Vineyard, just in time for the 50th anniversary of Jaws. British South African swimmer Lewis Pugh was the first person to complete long distance swimming in every ocean of the world. Kudos, Lewis. Good for him. He's a great endurance swimmer. Um, but he says on this swim, it's very different. We're talking about sharks all the time, joked Pugh, who will, as usual, wear no wetsuit. Just trunks and a cap and goggles. So they're building Pugh up as this wonderful champion of great white sharks. Who is going to change our minds that they're really wonderful creatures who we should throw our children into the water and let them grab on the fin and and ride with them like the dolphins and floss their teeth because they're so friendly. Right? That's what the article would lead us to believe. Pugh is undertaking the challenge because he wants to change public perception around the at risk animals, which he said were maligned by the blockbuster film as villains. So this article goes on. It's a 12 day swim. It's 62 miles, and he's doing it all the while this summer in Martha's Vineyard, where there'll be celebrations around the movie Jaws. So I get it. He's striking while the iron's hot, and I'm reading that article and I'm going, yeah, maybe. Maybe my mind is changing to towards great whites. This this guy has inspired me. And then you read towards the bottom of the article, he emphasizes that the swim is not something non-professionals should attempt, which made me wonder about how do you become a professional of doing something so dumb? He's accompanied. Here's the here's the catch. He's accompanied by safety personnel and a boat and a kayak, and uses a shark shield device that deters sharks around him with an electric field without harming them. It all add up, does it now? If you were so convinced that these kind creatures just want to snuggle you, they weren't looking to bite. They just want to gum you a little bit. You would swim with no shark shields and no boats. Wouldn't you? Doesn't add up. You can't just say it's a change of mind, but your actions betray you, don't they? That's repentance. Now, granted, we want to encourage faith, don't we? When somebody says they're repentant, we want to believe it with all our heart. But we also time and truth go hand in hand. There's something that needs to be seen. That's the fruit of it. And the fruit of a repentant life is that we would obey God. And they did. Look at the end of this section. The sons of Israel did exactly what Samuel said, because they truly from the heart were broken. And they removed the Baals and the Ashtaroth, and they served the Lord alone. They did exactly what Samuel, by way of God, told them they needed to do. For the first time in a long time, they were on the road to renewal again. Samuel said, gather now, this was the sons of Israel, the house of Israel he had been speaking to. They were doing what he said. And then he says, we need to throw a worship service. So gather all Israel to Mizpah and I will pray to the Lord for you. We're going to consecrate this moment. So verse six, they gather, they pour water out on the ground, that in the scriptures can be symbolic of repentance and change. Lamentations 2:19 arise, cried aloud in the night at the beginning of the night watch. Pour out your heart like water before the presence of the Lord. That's what that was symbolizing. It was this pouring out. We're done with ourselves. And they fasted, maybe symbolic of we don't need the pleasures of the world. We can feast on God. And then the most important thing. The ownership. What do they say? What every truly contrite sinner from the heart would say. We have sinned against the Lord. That's on us. And Samuel judged the sons of Israel at Mizpah. So this scene ends. Amazing, doesn't it? I mean, if you've been with us for the last few months from the beginning, this is a far cry from what Israel had been doing. And, oh, if it could just end there. Hollywood ending. Samuel's out of the shadows. Israel's repentant back on the road to spiritual renewal. But it never goes that way, does it?  
Number two on the path. The road to spiritual renewal strives toward dependence on God's help. It would appear that the deed is done. Everything's good. Celebrate good times tonight. Except for this is a prime time for the enemies of God to strike right after this great moment of revival. Bible. Renewal. Reconciliation to God. Enthusiasm for him. They get attacked. Can you relate? Can you look back at times of renewal in your own life? Times of listening to a sermon, times to be determined and zealous for the Lord? Maybe it was just last Sunday. Kurt's sermon inspired you. I'm going to apply that. I'm going to do that. And then you got home and got in a blow up argument. You got fired the next day, there's some trial was brought upon you and had nothing to do with sin in your life, and you just got knocked back completely, right? This happens to God's people. Who's in control of it is the question. So the text makes it seem like, hey, the Philistines heard all Israel, all Israel, the sons of Israel are gathered to Mizpah. And it's been 20 years. They've had their thumb on them. They have been subduing Israel and the lords of the Philistines went up against them. They must have thought, hey, we don't know. We don't really care what they're doing. We just know it's no good if they're all gathering together. So let's get the troops together. Let's go attack! WouldIsrael budge? Would they depend on God to help? See, here's the test. I mean, they did all the religious stuff, didn't they? But now this is where your faith has to get up and walk, doesn't it? Out there. So the sons of Israel said to Samuel, don't cease to cry to the Lord our God for us, that he may save us from the hand of the Philistines. Oh, what is changed in 20 years? Where was their hope before? It was in the it of the Ark back in chapter four, verse three. Let us take to ourselves from Shiloh the ark of the covenant, that it may come among us, and deliver us from the power of the enemy. Who are they trusting in now, 20 years later, they're trusting in God. I'm not saying anything about the Ark. They say, Samuel, would you pray? Oh, get on your knees in that moment and pray. That's dependence. Would you pray for us that he would save us from the hand of the Philistines? They didn't come up with some cockamamie scheme like they did at the beginning of chapter four, when they came back wiped out by the Philistines. And we need a new plan. We need something like a magic ark to deliver us. And they get demolished even worse. No, they just say we need prayer. We need God to save us. And they didn't stop there. Samuel, in his role as priest, now takes a lamb and sacrifices it and cries out to the Lord on behalf. And here's the action. It's just breathtaking. Samuel is offering up the burnt offering and same time the Philistines are drawing near to battle. Could you picture it? Thousands of Israelites praying, crying out to God. Samuel's making this sacrifice and they could hear the hooves of the horses coming. Think they were scared? Absolutely. They were scared. But where was their trust this time? Their trust was in the Lord. Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, maker of heaven and earth and destroyer of these little bitty Philistines. They're just a minor problem. They don't know how the story is going to turn out, but they were told they're acting in faith. Why do I say that? Because back in verse three, the last thing that was promised is if Israel you with all your heart, remove the foreign gods and direct your hearts to him and serve him alone, God will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines. God didn't wait very long to test that, did he? He doesn't wait very long in our lives often. You think? Why would he do that? That sounds kind of cruel. No. It's brilliant. It's brilliant because when are you at your strongest? When you've just admitted your weakness, when you've repented, when you've turned back, you're actually where... You're at your strongest. You're not at your strongest when you think you're at your strongest. You're at your weakest because it's in you. But when you've repented, when you've abandoned all hope in yourself, and you've said, I am determined, Lord, to be loyal to you and faithful to you and follow you, and I trust in your promises. What an opportune time for your sovereign God to design what looks like an attack. In this case, it really is. Who's in charge here? Philistines led by demonic forces. Yeah, they're doing what they would, of course do. They're going to try to crush them out. And God's saying, here's the chance, Israel, you have not succeeded in decades in defeating anybody. But now that I have your heart again and you're trusting in me, you're depending on my help. What am I going to do? The Lord thundered with a great thunder on that day. So the Philistines are charging in, the war horses are coming, the spears are drawn. And on that day against the Philistines, God thunders out of heaven. Psalm 29. The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars. It thunders from on high. It's over the waters. And you know what it's like when thunder hits in the middle of the night. You wake up out of a dead sleep. Multiply that times a hundred here. These Philistine soldiers were wide awake, and they were bloodthirsty. And he stops them in their tracks and they run. Now, here's the cool thing about God. You're like, hey, wouldn't it have been enough for him to just bring down some fire and brimstone and smoke 'em out? And Israel could just, like, get up from prayer and be like, oh, that was great. All in a day's work, guys. No. He wants to produce even more faith in them. So he scares the Philistines. And then verse 11, the men of Israel. And that that weakness they had before of trusting in themselves and their own strength and the Ark. They go out and pursue those Philistines and strike them down as far as they could run. He wanted to get more faith out of them, like he wants to do with you and me in these moments. If you ever want to see that that idea of God's sovereignty and our responsibility working out in real time, you have it right here in verse 11. The work wasn't done. You know what? Because they're not only believing in the promises of God delivering them from the hand of the Philistines, they're also remembering going back to Joshua. They were to what? They were to rid the land of all of God's enemies. And now they're doing it again. They're walking by faith. They're back on the path. It wasn't just a one time repentance. This was striving towards dependence on God. And Samuel as a good shepherd to them and a leader of the people. He says, all right, let's memorialize this thing, takes a stone, sets it, sets it between Mizpah and Shen, and names it Ebenezer. That's rich. Why is it rich? Where was the place they got wiped out three chapters ago? 30,000 of them, Ebenezer. A place that meant God is my help. A stone of help. And he says, you know what? That was us. But we don't live in the past. We live out of the past. That was us when we lacked faith, when we didn't go to God for help, when we localized what we thought God could do in an Ark. And now we see that it's about him. Our relationship with him. Repentance to him. Direction of our heart towards him. Serving him. Praying to him, fighting with him. So let's call this place Ebenezer. Isn't that our lives? Who we once were? But now we're a new creation. And any time we look back, we don't go back. We look back and we say, that was me, but that's not me now. And when you do that in those moments of faith, when you keep track of those moments where you said, I could go back right now, I could lack faith, I could go back to that sin I could get. And you say, that's not who I am. So raise up an Ebenezer in your life. Keep a journal of it. Share it with people. Teach your kids. Parents. Why do we repent to our kids? One we want to model what repentance looks like. Don't expect them to do it if you don't. But then you talk to them about it. You tell them as they are ready to hear it, who you were and who you are now, to give glory and praise to God, not to yourself. That's real then. Otherwise it's fake. It's that religion of the Pharisees. The hypocrisy we talked about a few weeks ago, isn't it? I just I'm a parent with a mask. The dad that never messes up. The father that leads in repentance. The mother that leads in repentance. The parents that show repentance. The grandparents that do it. The disciplers that do it. That's going to ring true with them. But faking it won't. Not for a second. So this is the real thing. God keeps his promise. Verses 13 says The Philistines were subdued. They didn't come anymore within the border of Israel. The hand of the Lord was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel. I mean, now that's a great ending, except it's not.
We got a couple more verses 14 to 17. And this is this is where we stay now. We've gotten back on the path. We're dependent in prayer. But we need his Word. We need to stay submitted to his Word, brothers and sisters. And that's what we see in 15 to 16. I'm not just making this up. In fact, God wants to really seal it into my and your mind so much. It's repeated three times. It's the theme of the postscript on the story of Samuel, the prophet in the prime of his life, when he was doing his best work, repeated three times. Verse 15, he judged Israel. Verse 16 he judged Israel. Verse 17. There he judged Israel. Are you getting the point? And what was the primary means of Samuel's judgment as prophet? The Word of the Lord came to him. And from Samuel it went to all Israel. That's staying in submission to the Word of God. The heart of his spiritual leadership was speaking on behalf of God. He's a 2 Timothy 3:16 guy. All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, training in righteousness. That's what he was doing all those years. To all Israel, just riding around a circuit preacher, it says, going around to Bethel and Gilgal and Mizpah, and then even in his home. Everywhere he went, the word of God went. That's how you stay on the path. It starts with repentance. It starts with your heart being directed back to the Lord. It proceeds in dependence, in prayer. But oh, how we stay under it through the Word of God. Imagine this a sermon on turning back to God. And what do we need? The means of grace. The word in prayer. Is it complicated? It's not really. But is it hard? Absolutely. To stay on the path, as Samuel displays even here, it's just long obedience in the same direction under the faithful teaching of God's Word. Samuel's kind of a picture to me of how the Word of God works in our conscience. It rides around and at every stop, at a lie, at an error, at a temptation. He rides around and he says, no, that's not what you're going to do there. No, Adam. Reform your ways. Adam. Repent of that. It rides around in my conscience, constantly reminding me of God's expectation to live for him only and entirely his. That's why you need the Word of God, friend. Personally, yes. But corporately, in a local church, the accountability of the church. We learned this last week. Kurt ended with it. Biblical preaching, biblical fellowship. Biblical shepherding. Why? So all of those means to the one great end of keeping the Word of God. What? Over you and around you and underneath you. Protecting you. Keeping your conscience sensitive, not calloused. So whatever fresh commitment you have made to God today, mark an Ebenezer in your soul. This, like Samuel's end, is a plodding perseverance, not some sentimentalized Christian experience that we could conjure up today, here now and gone tomorrow. That's what Israel did. They localized it. They just wanted the experience. They wanted the high. They wanted to get back to the feel. And it wasn't there. It was in steady, faithful, dependent submission to God and His Word. It's the same for us. So find a home and a faithful church. Build your life in submission to the Word of God. The road to spiritual renewal today is one of repentance and dependence and submission. There's no other way besides that. If you're not in Christ today? You have to turn to God. The only difference... I mean, you could have listened to this whole sermon. And the only difference all. Everything I said, turning to God, repenting, directing your heart. All of it. The only difference is you're not returning. You're turning. You get that? For the first time, turning to God, realizing you were headed in the opposite direction in unbelief. Your primary thing you turn from if you're not in Christ this morning and you know it is turning from your unbelief. Now, could there be a host of sins in your life that need to change? Yeah. Welcome to real life. Ask any Christian in here that doesn't change. As Luther said, the Christian life is one of repentance all the time. We're always turning from sin, aren't we? I mean, has any Christian in here discovered any different way to live the Christian life besides turning away from sin and turning to God? But for you that aren't in Christ this morning, the primary thing that you turn from is unbelief. Not really believing that you're the sinner that needs saved and Christ is your only way. That's what you need to do right now is call upon him. Return to God. Seek him. Serve him. Depend on him, submit to him, and love him. It's all about wholehearted devotion to him. Let's pray. Father, we thank you this morning for your Word. Thank you for first Samuel 7, a wonderful picture of you not giving up on your people. When it looked like to them maybe that you had for 20 years. But you used that time of silence and darkness and distance to soften them, to bring sorrow, and that godly sorrow that led to repentance and led to earnestness, led to prayer, and submitted to your word is in one beautiful chapter in the Bible, the picture of our lives. We thank you for that. Use your Word to work, Spirit for salvation, for the lost, and for strengthening of your saints. Amen.

 

How to Finish Well

Kurt Gebhards

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How To Finish Well

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Good morning and greetings in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ from the elders and Saints at the Grove Bible down in Brandon, Florida. Grateful to have the privilege of being with you here today and lifting high the authority of Jesus Christ and the power of his holy and noteworthy and glorious word. When you think about yourself, I hope there are parts of yourself that are even to yourself, hard to understand. I'll be honest when I think about this particular fact of my life. I don't understand it very much. I don't understand why I enjoy running so much as strange. If you were to look at my frame, you would wonder the same. You'd be like, I don't understand that. It is a great mystery to me. How many of you absolutely hate running? Speak the truth in church. That is a vast majority of this congregation. I understand why you would do that, and I don't understand why I would have such an interest in running. But it but it is true. But it's also true that while I call it running, I know for sure that you wouldn't call it that. Uh, most of you, if you had a gracious construct, would call it jogging. You would suggest that what I'm doing is jogging. But others of you, if you were more honest with what was happening, it would look an awful lot like stumbling and stammering and struggling very, very much. But I'm glad to call it running. And I've also had the privilege of competing in a few races in my day. Uh, 10-K'S, quite a number of them, and even a few half marathons. On my bucket list is to finish a marathon. Bill Johncock actually tried to help me carry me through a marathon, and, uh, he failed or I failed and didn't get that done, but I've finished a few half marathons, 13.1 miles. Keep the point. One. Okay. I mean, thank you very much for your thoughtfulness and encouragement. Uh, it's been a while since I've done that, but as I picture myself finishing these somewhat sizable races, I can picture myself really struggling to the end, just fighting with every ounce of energy that I have, uh, forcing every moment and motion of my body forward. I can imagine how I looked as I just basically collapsed over the endpoint of those races. I'm sure it looked like a horrible mess and a horrible struggle. But finish I did. And while I don't think that I've really ever successfully finished a race in a way that one might imagine with great strength and a surge of vitality...for the race of our Christian walks, may God give us strength and vitality and a surge to the end. My friends, the Lord Jesus Christ, the scriptures and the power of the spirit would have us not only begin well in Christ, but finish well in Christ. The Bible instructs us about how to finish well.

 

Years ago and listening to a sermon from Chuck Swindoll. He taught me this. It's relatively easy to start. Well, maybe you can think back to when you were converted, when you were born again. The large scale changes, a completely new set of friends, a new identity, a new purpose. For me, when I was born again, by the grace of God, I went from darkness to light. I went from hopelessness to joy. I went from foolishness to, well, working on wisdom. But God changed everything. And the start of that was so dynamic it was relatively easy. But he also commented how it's relatively easy to continue the Christian life. You're establishing your family by the grace of God in Christ. You're learning theology. You're understanding what it means to be faithful and fruitful in him. It's easy somewhat to start the Christian life. It's easy somewhat to continue the Christian life. But it's very apparently friends...it's very, very hard to finish. Well. And oh, to finish well. Oh, to finish well. To finish with a surge of passionate motion towards Christ. Friends, make sure that you don't have any category of coasting in the Christian life. No category of cruise control. No allowance for indulgence through a plateau of resting on yesterday's laurels, but rather a passionate interest in finishing well for the glory of Jesus Christ. Finishing well for God's testimony in your life...not to be sullied or dragged through the mud. Finishing well for those that you love, your spouse and your children. Finishing well for the generations that follow you. Finishing well for God's honor and God's purposes. Oh, that we would all with great earnestness, great desire, and great attentiveness to God's Word...finish well.

 

If you have your Bibles, and I hope that you do, please turn to Second Peter, chapter one. In Second Peter chapter one, there's a beautiful image in verse 11 that inspires this concept of finishing. Well, then paired with this image is a set of instructions about how you and I can finish well. Too many stories of breakdown at the end, too much tragedy in the final meters of the Christian race. But God would have you finish well. And if you turn in your Bibles to Second Peter chapter one, looking at verse 11, we'll see this image, and then we'll build our sermon around this key concept, this beautiful, beautiful picture of finishing well. Can you see in the Word of God open before you 2 Peter 1:11.  For in this way. What way? We'll get to that. "In this way, the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you."

 

Let me paint this picture. And I'll give you the outline of our sermon. We'll read the text and we'll get it. Here's the picture. May the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ be...what does it say?...abundantly supplied to you. The images of a runner coasting beautifully in the final moments of his life, culminating a life of faithfulness with a surge of spirit filled obedience so that even in the final moments there is a finishing, well, strength, surge, upshifting in the final hours of our spiritual journey. Pressing on to Christ so that the entrance. It's not obscure, it's not filled with doubt. It's not hard to find. It's not blocked with thorns and thickets of the world's troubles, but rather an open and beautiful entrance cruising to the end. With your Bibles open to Second Peter, chapter one, uh, we'll read it in just a moment. Let me give you the outline. We have three points. The third point will take most of our time, for sure, but I wanted to capture this entire series of arguments. The Bible, I hope you understand, is built around arguments. The Holy Spirit is arguing for salvation in Christ, glory to God and in this case, how to finish well. So we're going to pick up the first two steps of the argument in summary form. And I'll give you some homework because most sermons good sermons give you homework. So we'll hit those first two ideas in summary form. And then we'll settle into the third portion of this passage 11 through 15, and talk about how to finish well and the ingredients. There's kind of a twist ending here that's quite interesting to me.

 

But the first part of this is being saved by grace. We'll read that in verses one through four. The second part, this is the outline that we're going to be functioning under, saved by grace, sanctified number two, sanctified through diligent effort. And then number three, how to finish well, verses 11 through 15...saved by grace, sanctified through diligent effort. And I'm telling you that in advance. So as we read it, you'll see some of these markers. We'll talk about it briefly, and then we'll get to this third portion toward the end. So if your Bibles are open. 2 Peter 1:1-15 reads as follows. This is God's holy word.

 

"Simon Peter, a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of God our Savior, our God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. Seeing that his divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence. For by these he has granted to us his precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust." Verse five. "Now for this very reason, also, supplying all diligence in your faith. Supply moral excellence and to your moral excellence, knowledge and to knowledge, self-control and in your self-control, perseverance and in your perseverance, godliness and in your godliness, brotherly kindness and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these qualities is blind and shortsighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about his calling and choosing of you. For as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble. For in this way, the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. Therefore, I will always be ready to remind you of these things, even though you already know them and have been established in the truth which is present with you. I consider it right, as long as I'm in this earthly dwelling to stir you up by way of reminder, knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me, and I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure you will be able to call these things to mind."

 

So three points, third point taking most of our time. First point that finishing well includes saved by God's grace. To finish well, you got to start well. To finish well, you have to actually begin the Christian race. And the only way that you can begin the Christian race is to receive it from the grace of God. 2 Peter 1:1-4 makes this point about salvation being from God alone. In fact, Psalm 3:8 says, salvation belongs to our God. God himself is the possessor of salvation and the distributor of salvation. And so we recognize that if we are to have salvation, it's because we have, verse one, received it from him. The homework that I'll give you in verses one through four as we talk about salvation by grace alone is to identify the eight gifts of salvation in these four verses alone. I mean, verses three and four has this extraordinary list of blessings given to you in salvation. And you can go well beyond this list, uh, to think of other scriptures that list 20 to 25 to 30 blessings of salvation to every sinner that would receive. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever would believe in him would not perish but have everlasting life. God the father, the son, and the spirit wrote a plan to send Jesus Christ to the earth to die a horrible death, to save sinners like you and like me. Radical truth. A remarkable truth. But the reality, sadly, is this...too many people refuse to receive because they stiffened their neck and closed their arms. God will not force into your closed arms the reception of salvation he calls to us to receive. So I want to ask you, what is your attitude towards salvation? Is it this?...prove it to me. Or is it this?...you wronged me God. Is it this?...I'm not playing your game. We heard this testimony. I think it was Sean that alluded to that his arms were closed to salvation. But is that honorable? God is offering you eternal life. Would you simply be willing to open your hands to receive it? He's calling to you. Will you receive the free gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ? The hands that are open to receive this free gift. And by the way, this isn't preacher talk. I want to say this before I tell you about the hands that receive it. I'm not sure. Of course, I'm not sure where you're coming from spiritually. Some of you have been in Christ for many, many years and your examples to us are finishing well, surging to the end, seeking God. But I'm also sure in a room this size, with this many people, that there are people that are coming this morning that don't know nothing about, no churchy stuff. You know, I have a Bible to bring. You didn't know you're supposed to bring a Bible. And it's pretty heavy, pretty quick. I want to say to everyone, we're glad that you're here. Thank you. You're welcome here. This is a place for you. And why don't we come to receive gifts from God? How do we receive salvation from God? How do you even receive this sermon? If even you're new to all this, how do you do that? Two hands receive his gifts...the hands of repentance and faith. Turn from the sin that has separated you from your God through rebellion, selfish indulgence, pride, and foolishness. Repent and believe. Biblical belief is a trust. It is reliance. It is a looking to him, not to self, placing no confidence in the flesh, but placing all of our confidence in Jesus Christ. Would you be willing to receive salvation through repentance and belief? Well, those of you who are in Christ, I've given you the homework. Find those eight gifts in these few verses the eight gifts of salvation. They're remarkable, and they're for us to enjoy and to apply. If you're going to finish well, you need to be saved by the grace of God. Number one.

 

Number two, verses five through ten. You need to be sanctified by diligent effort. Now, sanctified is a fancy Bible word. Okay, sanctified. I think some of you know what it means. Of course you do. Sanctified means growing in Christ. Sanctified is the path that tremendous thrill and adventure of following Christ. What a great adventure it is. I mean, it leaves us speechless as we consider his kindness to give us salvation and then to have us walk in his ways...what a thrill. And so the argument here in verse five, I hope you, I hope your Bibles are open and you can see this. Peter says, because of all that he's done for you in salvation...now, verse five, for this exact reason work your tail off. I mean, get it. I mean, make every effort. I mean, this term for diligence is an extraordinarily beautiful and powerful and compelling concept for our lives. Peter's argument, the Holy Spirit's argument is just this. Salvation is something you make no effort. You just simply receive the free gift. But now that he's done for you what he's done for you in Christ, by all means. What does it say? Make how many efforts? Thank you, Vicky. Make all efforts. Making every effort, all diligence, applying all diligence. Wow. As we reflect on saved by Grace verses one through four, maybe as we look at that list, we cultivate a greater gratitude for what he's done. God forgive me for being so thankless for all that you've done for me in salvation. And now for the second point, about being sanctified or growing in Christ through our effort and diligence. As you're taking notes either in your mind or in the notes sheet in front of you. What area of your life needs greater diligence, greater attention, greater effort? Because it talks about supplying all diligence, supplying a great effort, making every effort. God loves us so much he doesn't want to leave any aspect of our life, unredeemed or unsanctified. He doesn't want for any portion of our life to not be advancing in him.

 

So that's why in verses five, six, and seven, he lists eight areas of spiritual growth. Just like there are eight gifts of salvation, verses one through four. There are eight areas of spiritual growth in these few verses. Take this as your homework. Jot it down. Make it a study for this week. How is God pressing into your life a greater diligence, a greater zeal, a greater effort, a greater acknowledgement of all that he's done in a greater, more wonderful outflow of the effort that he's given us? Look at verse eight. For these qualities or these virtues are yours. And ah, what does it say?...if they're yours and are increasing. So Peter just doesn't expect us to have a significant achievement in all eight of these categories. He expects us to have a significant achievement in all eight of these categories, and to have all or most of these categories increasing to the end. What a calling. Enough of American Christianity that just chills and coasts. It's an absolute blight on Western evangelicalism that many people think that salvation is the end of a process, not the beginning of it. Salvation is the beginning of this privileged life of communion with Christ and commission with Christ. It's the beginning. It's the start. And now it's ours to race well, run hard. All diligence, every effort. None of us have applied all diligence in every category. None of us have. All of us have room to grow. When you come into God's presence to hear God's Word, I'm sure you're mature enough to recognize that he wants to do business with your soul. So maybe this is the business that he wants to do with your soul, and you identify an area where you have been passive, self-indulgent, self-interested, lazy, slothful. All of us can think of several, if we're mildly thoughtful for mere seconds. May the Lord give us insight so that we can, in Christ, identify clearly where we can make every effort and glorify his name. Look at verse ten. This idea of diligence appears again therefore, brethren. At the close of this part about sanctification. He's saying, therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about his calling and choosing of you for as long as you practice these things. Ongoing practice. Yes, we're talking about practice, Y'all...practice. For as long as you practice these things, you will. What does it say? Verse ten. You will never. What? You'll never stumble. This is finishing well. This is finishing with strength. This is surging to the end. Not stumbling, not stammering, not struggling, but strength in your stride so that you can grow and finish well. I'll say this, I think of the ways that I've fallen short in so many ways. I would imagine again, in a group this size, that a great number of you have been hurt by people that have professed Christ and cursed him with their actions. They hurt you. They betrayed you. They were false. They talked a big game about being Christian. And then they lived according to their father, the devil. I'm sorry for that. I regret that horribly that that is the experience of too many in the room. Maybe that's your primary reason for unbelief. While I apologize for that horrible missed feeling on behalf of that hypocrite, Christ is not that way and will never treat you that way. Look to Christ. Trust in Christ. And I will suggest by personal knowledge, I know of dozens of people in this room that are absolutely the real deal. Imperfect for sure, but sincere for sure. Saved by God's grace for sure, and sanctified according to his power and glory. And maybe that will be a brighter light for you to follow if you're willing to give God this extra shot. But we recognize that too many people are stumbling, flailing, and falling. There are ways for you to never stumble.

 

So we've considered how the Christian life begins. It starts with saving grace, verses one through four. It continues with sanctification and growth, with every effort and diligent awareness and mindfulness of his purposes.

 

And now, number three, how to finish well, verses 11 through 15. We're just going to focus on the details of verses 11 through 15 as we consider how to finish well. And as we dive into this third part and kind of acknowledge what to me is kind of a twist in the argument. Um, uh, let's turn to chapter three, 2 Peter, chapter three. It's quite interesting. I'll give you the twist in just a moment. This isn't the twist. Um, you'll see in second Peter chapter three three times in the close of the letter that Peter is driving home one extraordinary theme. It's a very important theme. He emphasizes this theme in the first book as well, 1 Peter, but we're in 1 Peter 3. Look at verse 11. Peter is extraordinarily concerned about...holiness. Very, very interested in our spiritual blamelessness. 2 Peter 3:11, 14 and 17 gives us this punctuated end to his letter. 2 Peter 3:11 says, since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, he just talked about how literally all the things that we know in a material level are going to be, atomically dissolved, like broken down on an atomic level. So all these things, physical things, are going to be destroyed in this way. Look at this phrase. This is so powerful. What sort of people ought you to be? That's a great question. Since this world is a meaningless, not set, this world is disappointing in brokenness and breakdown and difficulty and it's all going to be destroyed. What kind of people should we as Christ followers be? What kind of people? He answers it...holy and godly. Man, that's awesome. He's like, look, it's all going to be burnt to a crisp and pulverized. So what should we be? People that have our minds and hearts set on holiness and godliness. Verse 14, is the next step in our argument. Therefore, beloved, since you look at these things, he's talking about the warnings to the godless. Since you look for these things and then the promise of God in salvation and be diligent to be found in him, by him in peace...spotless and blameless. Spotless and blameless. Just a repetition of the theme of holiness and godliness...set apart for God. No stain. Oh, just Christian for a moment. What is the nature of the blood that has saved us from our sins?...1 Peter 1, the lamb was known as a spotless and unblemished lamb. You have been purchased with the blood of Jesus Christ, who never sinned in attitude, action, or aspiration. He never sinned. He was a spotless and blemishless and blameless lamb. You have been washed in that blood. Now, friends, wear it. Walk in his righteousness. Depend on him for all the stuff that is so hard...so hard. I had a conversation recently with a new friend, and I was trying to convey the essence of Jesus Christ and salvation, and I just made this point to him. I said all the things that we need for life. This is a well-adjusted, thoughtful, smart man. So all the things that we need for life, um, none of them are intrinsic.  None of them are found on the inside. All of them come from the

 

outside. I need love. I'm not made of that. I need truth. I doesn'tcome from me. I don't I didn't generate the truth. I need grace, I need forbearance, I need patience, I need goodness. None of that is found inside. It comes from God on the outside. And we need to depend upon him. We receive the sacrifice of his grace, spotless, unblemished and blameless. And now we're to be that, too. 2 Peter 3:11, 3:14 now verse 17. Again, this is a punctuated conclusion to his letter. You therefore, beloved, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard, so that you are not carried away by the error of sinful, wicked, unprincipled men, and fall from your own steadfastness or stability. Peter's warning...don't be deceived or tricked by wickedness and sinfulness, so that you then become unstable flying in the wind. Flittering about like a castaway piece of paper in the afternoon air. Established. Strong. Steadfast. Stable. Hey, listen to me. When we're in our right mind, we really want this for ourselves. But more importantly, maybe this is persuasive to you. How much you want this for your children and how much you want this for the generation yet unborn. Let me say it this way. If you want your kids to be established in Christ, you need to be granite. Let me say it in a negative way. Never anticipate your kids standing strong in Jesus Christ, loving him, and serving him if you cut your commitments to Christ in half, if you cut your commitment to the church in half, why would you ever think that your kids would love the church and glorify God by committing to the church? If you cut your commitment to the Word of God in half, why would you ever expect your kids to treasure God's Word? Be the granite for them in stability, strength, godliness, and holiness so that they themselves can grow underneath the shade of your example. This call to holiness punctuates the second letter of Peter.

 

And now we return to verses 11 through 15 to talk about this twist. As I was making my way through this study, originally of this passage years ago, and and I thought to myself, God, the foundation of our lives is salvation by God's grace and all the gifts that come with that, Verses one through four. I then understand beautifully how we're called to then, for that very reason. Also, make every effort be all the more diligent to grow in what he's given us verses five through ten, and to be diligent and to see these qualities as ours and increasing. And then when he got to verse 11 and painted this picture of an abundant entrance, and then he told us how to get it, I was really surprised.

 

Let me summarize what we'll say now by giving you the third point. You finishing well includes an appreciation and healthy relationship to pastoring, preaching in the local church. That's really shocking. I didn't anticipate that hear from Peter. That's exactly what he says, that if you want to be established, never stumbling and finishing well, you will have a healthy relationship with biblical preaching, biblical ministry among the saints, and biblical pastoring from spiritual leaders. And that's our remaining outline. And I want to show you that here from the text that if you want to finish well, you must have an appreciation and appetite for biblical preaching, biblical ministry among the people of the local church and biblical pastoral care and love.

 

So we have this image of an abundant entrance again, the open field, the open square cheering people. Celebration. Cruising to the end. I want to just make one comment before we get to that three point outline. Sub points. Do you see again in verse 11 how the last phrase, it says that this entrance will be abundantly. What is the verb?...supplied to you. I read the word supply in verse five. You need to see this. This is fascinating. So what does it say in verse five? The same verb is given in verse five. What does it say? For this very reason, also supplying all diligence. Huh? Let me summarize this part of the argument. As you, by the power of the spirit and according to biblical integrity, supply all diligence to the establishment and growth of your faith. God is prepared to supply for you an abundant entrance into heaven. You supply. He supplies. It's beautiful. What Peter is doing here is questioning this eternal outcome of your faith. Jesus Christ Himself purchases you in salvation and protects you through the end. So Peter isn't saying that if you don't supply enough, then you'll somehow lose your salvation. That's not what is in question here. What's in question here is the quality of your entrance, the abundance of the entrance. Not whether you'll enter or not. That's Christ's business. It's how you will enter and how you will enter is your business. Oh, let us be about that business. I mean, think of the different categories that God would have us supply in. So just think about life. So if we're thinking about our diligent pursuit of Christ, what are the different categories of life that you would want to offer to God for faithfulness? Just think about the categories of life. What comes to mind, especially on Mother's Day? Things like what? Family, right? So how many of you want to take the category of family and be diligent to present that to God by pursuing him. What are some other categories that come to mind for you? Categories of life. Not family, but work. Some of you are gainfully employed. Some of you have the privilege of working for the Lord because you're retired from gainful employment. Others of you have as your job looking for a job because you really need a job. Whatever the case is, use your work as an opportunity to pursue him diligently. Family. Work. What else? Relationships. Discipleship. Taking personal spiritual responsibility for others. Your finances. What portion of your finances are being deliberately dedicated to God? What is another category or two? Aging. Whatever age God has given you, use it for the glory of God. If you're young, enjoy your vitality. Young bucks. Go get em. I mean, go get after it. And if you're less young than you want to be or used to be, then by all means, steward that for the glory of God. Maybe he's given you a little bit of wisdom or a little bit of temperance or a little bit of help. Through the years, some of all of us have paid for that education. Honestly, give it to the next generation through disciple making. What about your time as a category of life to apply diligence to? What percentage of your time is devoted and committed to Jesus Christ? Are you shouldering weekly Kingdom responsibility? Are you serving the church in a deliberate and committed fashion? Are you honoring him? These are the ways that we are diligent in our walk with God. And as we're diligent to supply to God our effort, then he's diligent to supply to us what again, verse 11?...an abundant entrance. So as we get into these three points, biblical preaching, biblical church relationships, and biblical pastoring, a critical element of enduring faithfully is appreciating biblical ministry. Peter is highlighting here the reality that finishing well involves the challenges brought about by uncomfortable preaching, uncomfortable ministry among the members, and uncomfortable pastoral leadership.

 

Let's look at these concepts again, focusing in on verses 11 through 15. Verse 12 says, therefore I will always be ready. To what? To remind you of these things, even though you already know them. That's interesting. Some people would call this nagging, but Peter is saying, I know that you know them, but I'm going to be diligent. To do what? To remind you. How do those reminders feel when you know that you know something and the person knows that you know that, and they remind you anyways? How does that feel? Does that feel good? Or maybe irritating, right? By the way, micromanagement may be in the eye of the beholder after all, so just jot that pro tip down for later. But as we receive reminders that we don't think that we need. And Peter is saying, I know you don't need this because you know it, but I'm here to remind you anyways, what he's doing is engaging in a biblical preaching ministry. When you survey the New Testament about the nature of biblical ministry preaching, this is you're going to get words like reminder. That's tough. Other words like warn, urge, exhort, rebuke, reprove, correct, train, declare. Paul tells Titus, let no one disregard you. That's pretty strong. He talks about pleading with tears and solemn testimony. Very, very strong words, preaching from the pulpit. That's tough. This is awkward. No true preacher enjoys obeying God's clear commandments for him to do those items in the pulpit, no one does. And does it feel good to y'all? It doesn't feel good. It's awkward, but it's right and necessary. If we're going to finish well, we need to submit ourselves to appreciate a biblical preaching ministry. I mean, what part of the words that I just told you? Warning. Correction. Reprove. Correction. What part of those words feel good? None. But to borrow the English of one of my favorite people on the planet. 'By golly, they work good'. Do they feel good? No. Do biblical loving ministries like this preaching ministries...do they work good? Yes. If you're willing to appreciate what's being offered to you. See Peter's saying, if you're going to if you have an ambition to finish well, you have to place yourself underneath the preaching ministry of faithful preachers who will take the Word of God, teach it unapologetically, and do so in a way that is unpopular and challenging to hear. Yes, it doesn't feel good, but by golly, they work good. And that's the work of the Holy Spirit through the power and authority of the Word of God, not the preacher. So we have biblical preaching. Sometimes it's unpleasant, but it's beneficial when lovingly applied.

 

Biblical preaching, and then biblical ministry among the people. So this is a second aspect of what Peter's teaching here. He says not only is the preacher

 

going to press in, but the people are going to press in, and he uses the verb stirring up. In fact, this is one of his favorite metaphors. It's really interesting. Verse 12, always to remind you, verse 13, to stir you up by way of reminder, chapter three and verse one, stirring up the sincere mind by way of reminder. He's using this idea of stirring up. The word here means to agitate All clothes washers mechanize the work of agitating the clothes. So there's an agitator. That moves the clothes. And it's the moving of the clothes that catalyzes the cleaning of the garment. Don't we all need that ourselves? Join me in Hebrews 10:24-25. This is scripture that many of you are familiar with, but you need to understand, um, the argument of the book of Hebrews as it relates to what Peter is talking about here, because it's not just that the preacher stirs up, he's supposed to do that, but the people are designed to stir one another up, stimulating one another to love and good deeds. So just a couple of books back to Hebrews. Hebrews chapter ten, verses 24 and 25. Because when we talk about stirring up, we're talking about the nature of biblical ministry among the people, not just the preacher, but the people. Hebrews 10:24-25 talk about how we are called to stir each other up. Hopefully you can see it in the NASB translation. Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. And, my beloved friends, as if the day was drawing near 2000 years ago when this was penned, then by all means, it's drawing near today. The day is drawing near. You can hear the hoof beats if you're paying attention. And in light of the encroaching of the final hours of all of history, by all means we should obey what this says. Verse 24. Consider. Think. Plan. Work in your mind to consider. How to stimulate is maybe the softest rendering of this word stir up. It is maybe the kindest rendering of this agitational term. I hope and pray that you have good, loving people in your life that stir you up. They may agitate a little bit, but they're doing it out of love. They irritate because they care. They're trying to provoke you, push you out of love. To serve God. Love God. Honor God. Walk in holiness. Consider how to stir one another up to love and good deeds, encouraging one another as a habit of spiritual grace and goodness. You see, this stirring up is a function of the body of Christ. And if you're going to finish well, you're going to need to appreciate biblical preaching, appreciate biblical ministry among the people. So let me just in the notes that you're taking in your mind or in the sheet in front of you, who are you stirring up to love and good deeds? What are the names of the people that you're praying for and loving and teaching? And Lord, give me wisdom. Give me winsomeness, give me honor so that I can stir them up in the most effective way to honor you and to serve you. What are the names? So yes, that's biblical. Preaching sometimes is unpleasant but beneficial when lovingly applied. Biblical church and stirring one another up, sometimes unpleasant but beneficial when lovingly applied.

 

And number three, back in second Peter one in verse 15, he's talking about every effort in verse 12. This diligence of every effort is biblical pastoral ministry. I hear Peter saying not only my preaching, not only in the ministry of the body that is stirring up and reminding. It's difficult. There's a lot here that is abrasive a little bit. The third aspect is his biblical pastoral ministry. Will you just briefly turn to First Peter chapter five, just one page over, because in first Peter chapter five, there's an image that he uses here that's important for you to capture related to pastoral ministry. So if the preaching can be tough, let's appreciate it. If the ministry can be tough. Let's engage in it. And now the pastoral ministry and every effort associated with that. 1 peter five, the first phrase in verse two...Shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight. Pause there. An essential function of biblical pastoral ministry is to exercise oversight. Let me just take a moment to develop this concept so that you can understand what pastors are called to do, in part. Because in the ancient Near East it was a city state. Feudalism. Every city or town would have walls built around it, or else you would just be absolutely run over. So, uh, walls would be around even small cities, and the walls were there to keep the bad guys out, and then obviously to keep what's good or the citizens safe on the inside. Well, this is a metaphor because all of us have walls that we built up. All of us have areas where we try to protect and through isolation or privacy, we try to protect and we try to shield and we try to hide. When pastors are called to give oversight, it's like you giving a passport to that pastor to walk the ramparts, the city walls, the top of them, and to peer down into your life, to look out for protection and to look in for provocation, accountability and love. This is an essential command to the pastors to provide oversight, but it's a relationship that you work out with your pastors. Does that make sense? They can't provide oversight if you're like...if you bar them from Um, having passport. Build scaffolding so that they can climb the wall and look over where other people are. Vision is obscured from them. Build love and trust with spiritual caregivers so that they can exercise oversight and you give them access. Humility. Openness. Honesty. Relationship building so that you can give them access so that they can make every effort to have oversight in your life. Oversight is not a function of ruling so much as it is a function of observing, knowing, caring, warning, humility, relationship. So that the parts of your life they're scarier, darker. You'd like to remain hidden. If you're honest with yourself, you recognize that they need to be known and shepherded and cared for by you, giving passport to a pastor who will give oversight. You see, this is every effort is what Peter's talking about is the dynamic of a pastoral ministry caring, probing, pressing in love and graciously and honorably.

 

But as I pray for the friends that we have here in Hickory, North Carolina, I pray that wherever you go for the end of your days, you will have sanctified meddlesome pastors. That are bold enough and brave enough to offer themselves to say, I'm willing to go there under the rock with you if you will let me in. I pray for you that you will have leaders that will never stop, about asking about your heart, that you will have leaders that will never stop pressing you towards biblical living in every aspect of your life. Leaders that refuse to leave you in a compromised state. Leaders that will call you out and challenge

 

the sinful actions, attitudes, and reactions that are tolerated too often in the churchy world. Leaders that aggressively seek to protect the sheep, leaders that, despite the awkwardness, exercise oversight because of love and because of Peter's desire to make every effort so that everyone would finish well.

 

If you're going to finish well, you got to start well through salvation. You have to ignite that faith with diligent effort, pursuing in the power of the spirit all that God has for you. And then you need an appreciation for biblical ministry that includes preaching, disciple making among yourselves and pastoral oversight that seeks to provide a path forward where there's no failing, no falling, and no stumbling, but an abundant entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

Pray with me. Lord, we would ask that you would help us because we fall short in many ways. Thank you for these remarkable statements. Stages of argumentation here in Second Peter. May we have the privilege of returning to this passage and reconsidering it, its depth related to salvation, related to sanctification, our growth in you, and related to really the dynamics of a biblical church. I thank you for Hickory Bible Church that exemplifies these ministry aspects disciple making, biblical preaching, biblical pastoral oversight. I thank you for the elders, for Pastor Adam, grace and blessing and goodness. Help this wonderful congregation finish well. We praise you and thank you. In Jesus name, Amen.

 

Take Heed of Religious Hypocrisy

Pastor Adam Ashoff

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Take Heed of Religious Hypocrisy

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The text we have this morning in Luke 12:1-7 is a wonderful text to prepare our hearts. It's the kind of text that when we're called to examine ourselves, 1 Corinthians 11:28 Paul says, when you take the Lord's table to examine yourself, this is the exact kind of text that you would want to be sitting under. It may not be the exact kind of text that you would think to preach right after the crowds of Easter. You know when you want to keep people around, when crowds show up, as they do in church. Attendance spikes every year around Easter time. If you really want to clear the room, you know, show up two weeks later with a sermon called Take Heed of Religious Hypocrisy. And that's just probably going against the grain of any church growth expert. You get a big crowd, you fill your church, you know, maybe give something a little more positive and encouraging. But actually, the truth of the matter is, for the disciple of Jesus Christ, who is the target of today's sermon, according to Christ's own words. It's exactly what we need from time to time. You could say all the time, but from time to time, a particular text that is for us to look on the inside. And, you know, drop the externals, drop the facade, and really examine the heart as this text does today. It's obviously not 1 Samuel, the series we've been in, we'll be back there in a few weeks. But I was just out of town helping at a church. I preached there since 2017 when they planted in Texas, and now they've finally found a pastor, so I wasn't candidating there, once again, clear up any rumors there. But I did, as I said weeks ago, double check that Whataburger is a legit establishment, and now that you see it out on route 70, it's a reality. I will let you judge for yourself. I mean, is this what we've all been waiting for in Hickory all these years? You know, just finally. And we're not getting to Trader Joe's. We're not getting an In and Out, but we get a Whataburger so we can be content with that. And we have a car wash, a 40th car wash now that, I checked yesterday. Today is the last day for the free car wash. So please, if you haven't enjoyed that one, it's all yours after church. Um, maybe it'd just be a line of HBC people inviting the guy at the window. He gives you the thing. Come back again. You say, hey, here's HBC. Come back and see us. But, it was down at that church. They're preaching through Luke that I was assigned this passage. And after spending time in it a few weeks ago and then preaching it last week, I did really just come to the point of saying, Lord, this is a wonderful passage for our church to hear. Uh, it was wonderful for my soul, and it was good for their church. And they took communion that day and we \are taking it today. So we will get back to 1 Samuel. That was a long walk for a short drink of water. Uh, so turn to Luke 12 1 to 7 and follow along as I read Christ's words to his disciples amidst a mass of moralists.
"Under these circumstances, after so many thousands of people had gathered together that they were stepping on one another. Jesus began saying to his disciples, first of all, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. But there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed and hidden that will not be known. Accordingly, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed upon the housetops. I say to you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear. Fear the one who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. Are not five sparrows sold for $0.02? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear. You are more valuable than many sparrows."
Father, it was your Son who said to his disciples. He who has ears to hear. Listen up. So may we listen up to your very Word this morning. Amen.
As we enter this scene, parachuting in to Luke chapter 12. Just to give you a quick glimpse of where Jesus is at. He's rounding third. This is the last year of his life. He's been ministering for two years. And crowds like we see in verse one of chapter 12...so many thousands. Uh, they could be there for any number of reasons by this point in his life. Some are there really still amazed by Jesus. Who wouldn't be by this point. The miracles that he's done, the works that he has done to prove that he is God, the words that he has said that he is sent by God to save the world, that would draw a crowd. And for some whose hearts were longing for that amidst the empty shell of Judaism...any love for God, buried under the law...man made, extra biblical by the Pharisees. Externalism to the extreme. Anybody that was looking for the truth was there to hear Jesus, because he offered the truth. But there were those who the Pharisees were saying, no, this Jesus is actually demon possessed, and he is not from God. He's the exact opposite. And you know what? He makes himself out to be God, so we should kill him. So it's a blend...the crowd is.  He has just gone scorched earth on the Pharisees in chapter 11. He was invited into their home, one of their homes, in chapter 11, verse 37. And, I mean, he wasted no time to get into it when they were judging him for something very external that had nothing to do with loving God. He didn't wash his hands the way that the Pharisees washed their hands. And the perfect teacher. He utilizes that opportunity in chapter 11, verse 39 to say, oh, you Pharisees, you clean the outside of the cup and the platter, but inside of you this is what a wonderful way you know to welcome yourself into somebody's home for a meal. By the way, you're full of robbery and wickedness, and he launches into six woes. Three to the Pharisees, three to the scribes. Scribes were those who wrote the law. Pharisees enforced it. They were in cahoots, all against Jesus. Uh, three against the Pharisees. Three against the scribes, pronouncing woes of judgment on them, because they missed the point entirely. They didn't get it. And when he leaves in verse 53, right before we get into our section, it says, the scribes and the Pharisees together began to be very hostile, so that it ramped up. The hostility was maybe at a seven, now it's at a ten. And they're questioning closely on so many subjects...why?...they wanted to catch him in something he might say so they could kill him. That's their mission at this point. They're no longer curious, interested on the fence. What is this new teacher have to say? Kind of like Nicodemus in John chapter 3. He came to them in the darkness of night. Teacher of the law....nobody. These are not those guys. These are not like Nicodemus, I should say. They are out for his head and he knows it. And so this crowd comes around him, and they want to hear him teach. And like I said earlier, you know, in the aftermath of Easter, when you have the big crowds that show up, you don't know exactly why people are there. Usually the crowds dissipate after that. But you would think that you would want to really capture the frenzy of the moment if you're Jesus, by saying something that would kind of win them over to you, especially those who would even purport to be your disciples. That would make sense, according to Adam, I guess. What does he do there in verse one? He actually looks at his disciples. We don't know if that was the 12 or 70 or more, but it says he begins saying to his disciples first. So he squares up on those guys and says, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.He calls them out. He gives a warning to his own followers in that moment, because what he's trying to help them see is look in the midst of all of this happening around me. There's something that could be happening within you. You might have a little leaven in your own heart. Those guys that I just lit up and pronounced curses and woes on them. Don't think disciples, you're not susceptible to the same exact thing because we're all susceptible to religious hypocrisy if we're honest with ourselves. And that's the warning for us today. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy, because it spreads so easily. Matthew Henry, famous Christian dead guy, wrote, "Jesus Christ said this, this warning in verse one to his disciples in the hearing of a great multitude, rather than privately, when he could have them by themselves, to add the greater weight to the caution, and to let the world know that he would not countenance hypocrisy. No, not in his own disciples." Catch that. He could have done this privately. He chose to do it in the midst of the crowds, the first thing out of his mouth. In the aftermath of meeting with these Pharisees and scribes, when thousands are literally trampling over top of each other to hear him. He's got a captivated audience, and he looks at his own disciples. And in order for them to get it loud and clear with one year left in his ministry before it's all over. Fellas, I'm not looking for fan boys. I'm not looking for people that just want to, on the outside, look pretty and nice. I want people to examine their hearts and love God with everything in them, not relating to the law for their righteousness, but relating to me. So the warning that starts a discourse in chapter 12 into 13 is beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, its hypocrisy and what he does that probably shocked their ears and hopefully wakes us up today is just...we know it's true, but do we think of it often enough that when it comes to our relationship with God, no one in the history of creation has ever fooled him once. That's the weight of God's glory that needs to rest on us today. Nobody has fooled God once. Nobody pulls the wool over God's eyes. Nobody dupes God. Nobody cons God when it comes to external performances, as if he doesn't see right through them to our heart. So nobody sang in here this morning, whether with the greatest expression or no expression, and faked God out about what was going on in here (heart). Nobody is listening to this sermon right now, whether sleeping already or intently, with notes out. He sees right through whatever you're doing on the outside to your heart today. He sees right through my preaching to my heart today because that's what he's after. He's always after our heart. And so this is a wake up call in the same way it would have been to these disciples, these followers. It's a wake up call to us to say, look, if you have just been in kind of the fog of externalism, of outward performance, ceremony, whatever you want to call it, this parts, the clouds, it drives away the fog and the clear light of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And the warning that comes with being amidst religious fervor in crowds and sitting in a church. It just blows it all away in such a refreshing and helpful way, particularly on a day that we are to take the Lord's table. So that's my word on how to listen to this sermon this morning. It's perfectly painful for self-examination. C.H. Spurgeon said of this verse, "He who is true, as in a true follower, will sometimes suspect himself of falsehood, while he who is false will wrap himself up in a constant confidence of his own sincerity." He who is true will sometimes a true believer, feeling the weight of the all-seeing and all-knowing and all wise eye of God, will feel the weight of that and sometimes suspect himself. Am I just putting on a show? What am I doing here? But the false...it never crosses their mind, wrapped in the confidence of the sincerity of their own lips, while their hearts are far from him. That's a self-examination passage. So that's why you would say. Yeah, Adam is probably not the one you want to preach two weeks after Easter. No, it's exactly the type of sermon a church needs to hear, because it's a kind of sermon that puts the focus on you. And especially when we're talking religious hypocrisy and of all sermons to be thinking of somebody else right now, you realize you've already given the game over. Because at the start of religious hypocrisy is everybody else needs this but me, Right? I mean, if you're just being honest, what's more external and judgmental than that? I've got somebody else in mind that I'm going to say, you need to go listen to this sermon. So let it hit you now, as you prepare for the Lord's table and examine your own heart, and then by all means, pass it on.  
Back to verse one. Let's talk about hypocrisy. Let's first see the disease before we get the cure. So he gives the disease in verse one. Then he will give actually three cures in two through seven. He will talk about the everything's going to be revealed. Everything will be judged because everything is known and accounted for. So shortcut to the end. We'll get to those cures. But we want to spend a little more time about this disease, the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. That word, borrowed from secular Greek was one that meant the play actor. I know some are like...Ashoff...there you go, or you didn't because you were the worst at it. And that's my point. Borrowed from the sophists and the philosophers and the Greek speakers of the day, they would come out on a stage and don the mask, and people would come and want to be fooled. You go to the theaters paying good money to be full. Had I ever made it in my failed career as an actor, you would have wanted a refund. You would have said, that guy. He's not convincing. He doesn't make me believe the unbelievable. That's what this word hypocrite was borrowed from. It was speakers that would go around and come on a stage and put a mask on and deliver lines, and then put another mask on and deliver lines. Epictetus, stoic philosopher in the Time of Christ, wrote the art of the actor is that from the moment he dons the mask, his whole conduct on stage keeps with his allotted role. So Jesus takes that idea and says, watch out for religious people who do the same exact thing. It's an act. Leaven...bakers know about the power of leaven...a little bit leavens the whole. But I'm not that guy. But I understand it when I look at my lawn. Five years ago I had grass. I have not intentionally planted one weed. I now have weeds. 80% of my lawn is weeds. And you know, I never saw it coming. I had one ne in the middle five years ago. I was taking care of babies, you know, twins came and new it through the church and Covid. And I look out and, man, that's a good looking lawn. And I needed a warning like, beware of the weeds of the Pharisees, which is ugly lawn. And now I just have weeds. And that's when I think of the warning of leaven, something that's underground under the surface. You can't see it, but it spreads. And then when it pops up, you're like, what do I do with this? It's taken over the whole thing. And that's the leaven of the Pharisees. That's what religious hypocrites do. They get so far into it. They're so immersed in it they don't even see it anymore. They have bought their own act. The Pharisees bought their own act. They actually believe they knew the way to God. So much so that God comes down to earth and they want to do what with him?...kill him. He could do the works of God. He could speak the words of God. You don't have a thing you can get on his life. Except, hey, did you wash between your pointer finger and your middle? Did you get that Jesus? Oh, that's what you're going to do with the Son of God, who can raise the dead and heal the sick and give sight to the blind. You're going to get him on his knuckle. You're going to strain out the gnat to swallow the camel...religious hypocrite. So that's the disease. If you want a good working definition from Jesus, it's this in Matthew 23:28. So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. I can't improve upon that definition. It has hypocrisy in it, and it draws the clear contrast. Externally righteous keeping the law, moralist clean on the outside, inwardly lawless meaning you don't actually want to keep God's law, but you'll do it because you fear man and you want to impress man, and you want to impress others, and you want to get praise. And if you're in a group of religious people like the Pharisees were the ruling body of Judaism at that time, whoever keeps the law the best and is the cleanest on the outside wins. Now that's nothing like us Bible Belt people, I know. And that's religious hypocrisy, simplified. The outside is kept clean. The inside is filthy. I thought about that yesterday, going to get my free car wash. That new place and the one deal. There's the Ashoff deal which is the cheap one for ten bucks. But then there was this one that does it all. I mean, but I was looking at my dashboard, and I'm long overdue for an oil change, but I can keep taking my car through that car wash and my engine's going to blow. Stupid isn't it? We do the same spiritually. We know we're hiding stuff here. We know we're faking it. We know we're putting on the outside. And so we clean ourselves up before lifegroup, before church, before whatever it is. We get the express wash and the inside is about to blow. And the warning lights are going on and you know it. Your conscience tells you that, Christian. But it's much easier just to go through the wash, isn't it? Just to work on the outside until you run into this verse. And why this is so deadly and damning and despised is because religious hypocrisy is lying and deception at the highest level. I mean, I get we don't like hypocrites generally speaking, phonies, but we tolerate them because life and death doesn't hang in the balance. When I was in Dallas last week, I was a hypocrite. I wanted to go on a run on last Saturday and some friend of mine in this church gives me hand-me-down running stuff. I think he's trying to drop a hint. Adam, I don't want you to drop dead. I want you to stay in shape. You know, I want to get a lot of mileage years out of you here. So he gives me nice stuff. Cool shoes, like futuristic shorts, you know, made of high quality material. You know, that wicks sweat away and stuff. I would never buy it for myself, but I look like a runner...until I run. And for further proof, I went out at 11:30. I had found a course next to the hotel that was two miles. I completed said course at noon. Thank you. That is approximately four miles an hour, which is the speed of a buffalo, not a running buffalo. They can get up to 25 miles an hour. I was four miles an hour walking buffalo. When I googled it Google actually wanted to add on and AI told me running two miles in 30 minutes is considered slow, especially for an adult. I didn't disagree, and so I had that physical picture in my mind, running, thinking I am faking people out. And then the spiritual happened. So I get to the end...30 minutes later. I'm sweating. I just want to get a drink of water. But sitting at the entrance of where I came to run are two Jehovah's Witnesses with the sign that says, you want to learn about the Bible. I'm like, yep, let's go. And the one kind lady looks at me and says, you look like a runner. I'm like, all right, Lord, you have set me up. So I said, no, ma'am, I am a hypocrite. I am not a real runner. And I'll tell you my time to prove it. And I said, but I have a question for you. You have this sign about believing the Bible. Can I tell you the verses I've been thinking about? And I'm not making this up. This isn't a bait and switch. I said, I've been running for the last 30 minutes, plodding, thinking about Luke 12:1-7. And I'd like you to help me understand how a religious person gets to heaven, you know. Help me with this. Because I read this and I said, it sounds like there's nothing we can do. And I know what they believe. And so we talk for two hours. And they were convinced that because they believed the Bible and I believe the Bible, you know, it's just kind of like we can agree to disagree. And I said, no, see, because here's the problem. All false religions are built on religious hypocrisy because you claim to know a God you don't know. You claim to know a way to heaven that you can't find. And it's not just bad enough not to know it and can't find it. You're trying to tell other people. That's hypocrisy at the highest level. It's one thing if I, the runner, just fake it, it's another if I would have stood at the gates and said, hey, can everybody let me tell you guys how to run...four miles an hour. And I tried to help them see that, that what they're doing and what I'm doing aren't the same. We can't both be right at the same time. And every false religion...bottom line, if you make it about anybody besides Jesus Christ as your salvation, and that his work isn't sufficient enough to get you all the way to heaven, it's religious hypocrisy at the highest level. It promises you heaven and it walks you into hell. You saw it last weekend at the Pope's funeral, didn't you? You're not going to find a more ornate, amazing, beautiful exterior than Saint Peter's Basilica. It's worth $5 billion if you were to build it today with the money they spent on it. 5 billion for the most beautiful building. Perhaps one of the most beautiful buildings ever built in the name of religion. And it's full of what? Dead men's bones because it promises a God that it doesn't know. It promises a salvation that you have to help get to. So when we're talking about religious hypocrisy, every false religion is built on the same lie, a lie of the highest order that will lead to the most hellish result. That's why it's serious for us. Because, again, I could talk to those ladies and I could watch the Pope's funeral and be like...and this is kind of the impulse most of us would have. Yep. They got it wrong...theologically, 100%. But experientially. I may be no different than them if I'm not careful. Because the hypocrisy that's like leaven that they believe is actually the truth, which is I got to work. What Christ did wasn't enough. Or in other false religions. Christ isn't even the Savior. But if I'm not careful, I will work just like all those other false religions and become so calloused to what's in here (heart) that I just think I'm fine because of everything I do out there. Right? Elders, we just went away for two days and we went through a battery of questions. Each of us, all eight, have an hour apiece to share about our lives. And these are the questions you got to answer. And they went through everything we could think of externally, internally, whatever. And I could have lied the entire time. I could have deceived them. I could have not told the truth about what goes on in here. And they could have done the same to me. You could go to life group this week with a battery of questions, mutual ministry time and you can deceive the people in your small group. This has to be something that God works from the inside out. Do you understand that? No amount of external pressure checked boxes, they're not bad in and of themselves, but they're not enough. If you're not willing to say and look inside and actually take this warning seriously, the danger of just adapting to outward external religion and not being worried about what goes on in my heart. Why do I do what I do?  Young people, kids in the room, your parents, they want you to behave like we want a civil society. We don't want anarchy in our schools. I get it...on our teams, in our homes. So we have rules for you children. But trust me, if your parents are in Christ and they understand the warning here, they want your heart far more than they just want your behavior modification. I mean, if you just think that's what raising your kids is about, parents...behavior modification, you will raise a religious hypocrite. You will. And if you don't understand what I'm talking about, maybe that's what happened to you and you're just passing it on. It's the heart. Do you love God from the heart? Do you want to obey him from the heart? If you love me, you keep my commandments from the heart. But if we just live in a world in our church and in our homes where we're just always evaluating by the externals, and over the course of time, out of fear of man, like these Pharisees, they wanted the glory of man more than the glory of God. It just became external. And it was dead on the inside. That's the disease. Macarthur says about this warning, "Jesus said more about false religion than he did about specific sins."  I.e., when you go back and read the Gospels, you'll see way more time Jesus spends warning of religious hypocrisy than he does of just calling out individual sins. And this is what MacArthur says. Why? "Because false religion provides a damning deception that sin does not provide." Let's run that back again. Jesus said more about false religion than he did about specific sins, because false religion provides a damning deception that sin does not provide. So hypocrisy is more dangerous to your soul than carnality. Because carnality I can see and you can see...hypocrisy you can't see because it does a good job of cleaning itself up on the outside. That's why it's more dangerous. It's more damning. It's not saying we should go around living according to the flesh at all. It's saying which the greater danger to a religious person. It's when you just try to live such a clean life. But that's all you evaluate yourself by...clean living. And there's nothing going on in here anymore. And Christians can be subject to this because that's what leaven does. It starts small in us, and we might grow up in a certain church subculture that just focuses on the externals. And before we know it, that's all we've ever known. And so we've just conformed to it. And we know the sinner's prayer. So we conform to the sinner's prayer because I guess that's our ticket out of jail. Religious hypocrisy provides a damning deception that sin does not. We hide it and it spreads. And the insidiousness of sin that is...awful in the sight of God. But when we try to cover it and we try to deceive, we have doubled down on our damnation. Because you don't even know who you are anymore. Have you ever thought about that in light of Matthew 7? Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my father who is in heaven, will enter. Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name cast out demons, and in your name perform many miracles? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you. Do you know what that moment is in a person's life? It's the great unmasking. He who dons the mask. The religious person that put on the mask and wore it his whole life will, on that day, stand before the Lord and he'll say, wait a second, hold on. I don't recognize you. And you go, no, no, no no no no no, this is me. I did all these things. And he goes, no no no no no. This is you. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness that was all the time still on the inside. That's the warning Jesus gives. The sobering warning of the damning deception of religious hypocrisy. That's the disease. David had it for a season. Committed adultery with Bathsheba. Tried to cover it up with murdering Uriah. Lived a lie for however many months until God sends Nathan. The sinfulness of what he did was one thing. And you hear about that in Psalm 51. But Psalm 32 has another interesting revelation of David's heart before the Lord. It's also a Psalm of confession. But listen to what he says differently in Psalm 32. How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. If you uncover your sin, God can cover it. If you try to cover your sin, you're saying, God, I don't need you to cover it. How blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. Where's that talking about? It's talking about the inner person that when I try to cover up my sin, I try to be somebody that I'm not. In my spirit there is deceit. The only way out of that is confession. I acknowledged my sin to you and my iniquity I did not hide. This is David finally coming to grips with the fact that he was a religious hypocrite. He wasn't just an adulterer and a murderer...for the months he tried to cover it up and keep it quiet, this man who had a heart for God, a man after God's own heart, it says about David. He was a religious hypocrite because he tried to cover it, and in his spirit there was deceit until he confessed it. And he said, until I did that day and night, your hand was heavy on me and my vitality was drained away, as with the fever heat of summer. God, if you are in Christ, he will not let you rest until you get real about it. And notice who David's getting real about it with...God. Get real with God first about it. He didn't say anything yet here about I needed to go back and tell everybody what I did and own it. He needed to confess it to God. Meaning from the time he committed adultery and he murdered Uriah, he wasn't even going to God anymore. But I promise you, everybody walking around the kingdom is going. I mean, there's, you know, there's David. Hey, we're winning victories, man. Kingdom's expanding. That guy's good. Best king we ever had. When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away. God will do that to you, child, because he loves you. And he doesn't, as we said at the beginning, the quote of Matthew Henry. He doesn't want to countenance any hypocrites in his midst. So that's the disease.
Now let's get the cure. Back to Luke 12. Three cures for the disease of religious hypocrisy.
First, verses two and three. It'll all be revealed one day before God. If that's the God with whom you will deal and in whom you fear. One day it will all be revealed, verse two. Nothing covered up will not be revealed. Hidden that will not be known. And it's not just the external outward stuff. It's the hidden, behind the scenes gossip, slander, speech, whatever it might be, verse three. Whatever you said in the dark will be heard in the light. Whispered in your rooms, proclaimed on the housetops. What is Jesus teaching here in totality? He's saying inside or outside, inside your mind, on your lips. Mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart. He's doing a total audit of everything that makes us who we are, by what we feel and what we say and how we think, he says, it's all going to be revealed before God. That's the first cure. Hebrews 4:13 there is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do.  
Cure number one, he knows our hearts. There is nothing you or I do externally, in so-called worship that fools him. Know that it will all be revealed. God alone will expose all that we conceal. That's the first attempt. The first assault on a calloused conscience and a hardened heart, even of a disciple. Sure, there were Pharisees in this crowd, but he's speaking to the disciples in the first crack in the facade is to say it will all be revealed.  
Second cure. God will judge it all, verse four and five. I say to you, my friends, which is comforting, isn't it? He's still speaking to his disciples as if they're disciples. He calls them his friends. My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body. Maybe he's...he might be giving a nod to those Pharisees who they could be fearing...who they know when the hostility is ramped up in verse 53, that Jesus has said, I'm going to die, I'm going to be handed over and killed, and I'll rise three days later. So he could be trying to give them like a quick, hey, don't be afraid of those religious guys who can kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. I will warn you whom to fear. Fear the one who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. Because what is going to happen to you at the judgment when all is revealed? If you've been concealing it. It's going to be all laid bare before him with whom we have to do. And he not only has the authority to take life, he has the authority over your eternal life. And he says, that's the thing you should fear. It was interesting when I was talking to the two Jehovah's Witnesses. Um, one of their claims is I was talking about this. They were like you know, cast into hell. Hell's not a real place. That word Gehenna is just a word for the grave. You just go to the grave and die. And I just said, wait a second. If that's all there is, then why would Jesus say, fear him who has the authority to do...if he doesn't have the authority to cast us in eternal hell...punishment, all that it says. Then we should just fear man, because you're essentially saying all that God can do to us is the same that man can do to us. They can kill us. Your heretical view of hell, Jehovah's Witness, you say it's just. It's just over then. Well, then you've just made God equal to man. And you say Jehovah is all...but right here it says we don't need to fear man because that's the worst man can do. But if the worst God can do is take our life, but he can't cast us into hell, then why should we fear him? Doesn't add up. But to the one who, after he has killed, has the authority, as Jesus said in Matthew seven. Depart from me. You're going to live on after this. You worker of lawlessness! I didn't know you. That's the judgment that we are to fear. God alone will judge our eternal destiny. And that's what helps us to live with a healthy fear of God and zero fear of man. It was said of the Scottish reformer John Knox as he was being buried at the graveside. One friend remarked, here lies a man who feared God so much that he never feared the face of man. So that's the second cure.
Third cure. There's all will be revealed. All will be judged. All will be accounted for. He's not going to miss one thing, verses six and seven. Are not five sparrows sold for $0.02 yet not one of them is forgotten before God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are numbered. He picks two very inconsequential things. Sparrows...five for $0.02. In Matthew 10:29, they're sold two for a penny. They were the cheapest thing you can buy in a marketplace, maybe where Jesus was preaching right now in this context, some people were selling some. The cheapest thing you could buy for a meal, two for a penny. And, here's like a real blue light special here, he says. Now you can get four for five, meaning that fifth one has absolutely no value. And he says, you want to think of the most valueless thing. That sparrow, that means nothing. Not one of them is forgotten before God...not one of them. They're all accounted for. They're all known. And then he says, indeed, the very hairs of your head are numbered, and you know, that's a good thing. Um, we track that some of us in the room are worried about the hairs of our head. And he says, look, he knows every single one of those. Some of us make it an easier count than others for him. He says he knows that number. But then again, he's saying, my disciples, my friends. He ends with this in verse seven, which feels like it doesn't fit at the moment. All this, everything's going to be revealed. Everything's going to be judged. All of it accounted for. Do not fear. You're more valuable than the sparrow. The valueless sparrow, the fifth one that I threw in for free. That God values that sparrow. My friend, my disciple, you're more valuable than that bird.
Now, you got to put all this together in your heart right now. Because this then becomes the great divide in your heart, doesn't it? All of this that if I am actually a phony, a fraud, an actor, I don the religious mask. All of this is very concerning because that judgment is going to lead to Matthew seven. I didn't know you, but if in all of the examination that the spirit uses the word for in your heart today before we take communion and remember the body and the blood of Christ broken and poured out for us, when you do that and actually realize all I have is Christ, my righteousness is not my own. I'm not putting on any mask for him. Then you feel the comfort of the end. Do not fear you're more valuable than those sparrows, because sparrows didn't die for you to live. The Savior did. My Son did. Child of God, you could get through the end of this and been on the edge of your seat in fear and trepidation that all will be revealed, all will be judged, all is known. But then you cast yourself upon Christ and you go, wait a second, what do I have to fear? If all of my hope for salvation is bound up in Christ, what do I have to fear?...absolutely nothing. Because it's either all of him or it's me. And yet we can, as Christians, even live for seasons of our life thinking it's all on us. And we put on the mask and we fake people out, and we don't actually be honest and open and transparent and accountable, which only keeps us more in our what?...spiral of sin and deception. And our spirit is heavy, and we're on the point of just feeling like we're entire frauds. And then in God's grace today, he could say, you are more important than the least important sparrow that doesn't count for anything. I thought of that when I was talking to those ladies, because down in the river, the thing I was running next to, there's all these birds diving down in. It's not really a river. It was this, like cement concrete waterway for when it rains down in Texas. And it's just gross junk growing up in there. And there's these ravens and birds flying in and out. And I'm thinking, Lord, how kind you are to me, for one, because you opened my eyes or I'd be like them. But how kind you are to these women that you would send me to preach in Texas, to pretend to be a runner, to come and meet them today and tell them they are lost in religious hypocrisy. Because those two matter more to God than the sparrow. And I told them that. And then I go and preach that the next day at the church, and after the second service, a woman comes up to me crying and says, you shared that story. What were the lady's names? And I told her the lady's names. And she goes, I know those women. My husband goes to the same church as them. He's a Jehovah's Witness and I've been praying somebody would get through to him. And maybe by you talking to Jackie and Barbara, they'll talk to him. Because she goes, right now he's out going door to door with my kids. But she took my evangelistic encounter as a reminder to her that she's more valuable than the sparrow. And God hasn't forgotten about her in all the years she's praying for her husband to come to Christ. I mean, that's what we have to understand is the beauty of this passage. It breaks us down. It strips away all the the fig leaves of our own making. We're like Adam and Eve, aren't we? We sew together fig leaves and they're threadbare. And we hide. And God says, where are you? And we come out and he rips us clean. He says, throw those away. I'm going to make a garment for you. The first religious hypocrites in the Bible were Adam and Eve, right? When they knew they were busted, they tried to make up for it on their own. And a gracious, loving God says, no, I'm not going to let you live that way. Take off those fig leaves and I will sacrifice and make you a covering. Friend, are we any different here this morning? How else are we coming to take the Lord's table today? Are you going to pray before the Lord? Before we take this communion and list off to him all the wonderful things you did for him this week? No. That would defeat the purpose of remembering his body and his blood. He says, remember this done for you until I come again. Don't ever for a second forget your salvation rests on my righteousness, not yours. I know you can live out of that, because the guilt and the shame and the blame have been put on Christ. If you're not in Christ this morning the Lord's table is not for you. It's what the Bible says, not me. Because you'd be drinking it. You'd be taking it in an unworthy manner, as if you actually believe it, but you don't. If you think you're wrestling and wrestling in some of your own righteousness this morning, communion is not for you, because it's the high point in our Christian experience on a weekly worship basis. We do it once a month. It says it's all of Christ and none of me. I've got the filthy rags. I've got the fig leaves. He has the perfect cloak of righteousness, and he drapes me in it. So if you're not in Christ today, what can you do other than to cry out to him? And you're more valuable to him than a sparrow. Especially if you've been sitting in religious hypocrisy in a pew your whole life. That through the power of his Word this morning, he can crack through the hardest veneer. And religious hypocrisy is the hardest veneer. Because it thinks it's fine. It looks at it's life and says, I'm good. And there's no one righteous. No, not one except Jesus Christ. Have you trusted in him today?

Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your Word this morning. We don't want to be fooled by the mask of religious hypocrisy, so remove it from us this morning. Help us to see ourselves the way your Word reveals us and you see us. Help this time of reflection that your Word would richly dwell in us to cleanse us from within. We ask in your name. Amen.

My Life Stinks

Pastor Jon Krick

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My Life Stinks

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Well good morning everybody. Welcome to our first Sunday after Resurrection Sunday. Back to reality. No choir, no special things happening. You're just stuck with me. I apologize. But somebody had to do it. In all seriousness, there were some pretty, uh, unique pictures on display during the sermon last week, don't you think? I thought it was, you know, some of them were really striking. There was somebody who made a reference to, um, the first, uh, disciples to run and see the empty tomb. And I think we found a more updated version. And, you know, I have a hard time wondering if, I think, Adam sees sombrero Jesus off to the side and in his love for sandwiches, I think that he. Didn't that look more like a loaf of bread on Sombrero Jesus's head than anything else? So anyway, I think I picture Adam for some reason, just being torn between a sandwich and then looking up at the Lord's head. No. In all seriousness, I just wanted to take a moment just to, really express my deep appreciation for these two men. Having served as a preaching pastor. And when the holidays, come and we ping back and forth between Christmas and Easter. Of course, with Christmas, you have, Christmas Eve service and then also whatever Christmas Sunday is going to look like. And then with Resurrection Sunday, there's Good Friday and then Resurrection Sunday. So those men really have to double down, and it takes a lot of effort and things don't slow down. In fact, they pick up all the ministry related things that aren't even connected to the messages or the worship and music on Sunday still go on. And so they still have to handle all those things. And of course, God has gifted them in a very special way, and it's very life giving for them to be able to do those things. So it's not a burden. But those of us know that even when we serve in the strength that he supplies, there's still an element that requires sacrifice and diligence. And these men, this is why it's my great joy to preach for Adam, this Sunday. Because at least, you know he got the Sunday off. Now, Ronald, he got the short end of the stick there. If I would try to lead worship and preach today, well, that would not necessarily be a blessing to anyone. But in all seriousness, can we just take a moment to express our sincere appreciation for the men who get up here nearly every single Sunday, to preach God's Word faithfully, to take worship songs that fit the theme of the message, and allow our hearts to be engaged in praise. Can we just thank them both? It is such a blessing to have them and we're grateful.
Well, now it's time to turn to the message. And as I thought about what I would preach, my mind kept drifting back to the reality that I was born and raised on a farm. Uh, any fellow farmers in here? Show of hands. Alright. Anyone? Uh, we've all visited farms, right? So, you may not know this, but we had dairy cows and pigs, horses, dogs and cats, of course. Um, but farms are really smelly places, aren't they? Um, I would say that they're distinct in that regard that they smell. But there's one particular stench that has always hung with me in my memory. And that was whenever one of the large animals would die. When a heifer or a sow, big, big adult animal would die. It's not like when a dog or cat dies and you just go to the backyard and you dig a hole, you know, bury them. No, these animals would require a massive hole. You can't do that to your yard. And you have to actually call a rendering service. And then they come and pick the animal up. Well, sometimes that rendering service can get there in the next couple of days, but sometimes if they're really backed up on farms. They can be there in a week or so. And just those animals laying out in the hot sun, cooking flies, maggots, all the other stuff that comes along with it. Before you know it, that animal can smell really, really badly. In fact, whenever that truck would come up our driveway, we would run for cover because it carried with it such a horrific stench that it just made you want to run for cover. And it was absolutely unforgettable. Now, on the same farm, there was actually a lot of very pleasant smells. We had lilac bushes on our farm. I love the smell of lilac bushes. Does anyone else? I got company there. They just. They look beautiful. They smell wonderful. Big, big fan. Of course we had fruit trees. We had apple trees and pear trees and raspberry patch, and that when those fruits ripen, there's a sense of smell. But you, you take it to a whole new level when my mom would, make an apple pie or a raspberry pie, right? Combined with the cinnamon, it would just fill the house. It was a wonderful aroma. And then another great smell was the sweet smell of alfalfa or hay being cut. It just has this really earthy, aroma that is just wonderful to smell. And of course, there was sweet corn after being shucked in boiling water. And all of it reminds us of summertime, which is coming soon. This is life, isn't it? This is our lives. It's filled with a variety of smells and aromas that cover the spectrum. Some disgusting stenches, some fragrant aromas. And this really does help us set the stage for today's message. Because if you've looked at the title, the message has an intriguing one. "My life stinks". And today we're going to address two spiritual realities that will determine whether your life will be a stench or be a sweet fragrance to the Lord. Two realities. Reality number one is this...the stench of sin makes life unpleasant. The stench of sin makes life unpleasant and reality number two...the aroma of Christ makes life so, so sweet. As already noted, there's a stark contrast between a stench and a fragrant aroma. Fragrances are pleasant. They're appealing, associated with beauty. They can enhance moods and evoke positive memories. While on the flip side, stenches are unpleasant, often repulsive. They are typically associated with death, decay, filth, or something offensive. The same is true spiritually and the Apostle Paul captures these realities in 2 Corinthians 2:14-16. I invite you to turn there. You can see it for yourself. 2 Corinthians chapter two, verses 14 through 16. And here is what God's Word says. "But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of him in every place. For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved, and among those who are perishing, to one an aroma from death to death, to the other an aroma from life to life." Verse 16 mentions both the aroma of death and the aroma of life to life, and these two distinct gospel focus and life versus death realities are seen and contrasted throughout Scripture. Have you ever heard somebody say, "my life stinks." We all have at some point, maybe not those exact words, but we understand what they mean. My life stinks. Well, Scripture actually affirms that to be a very true and accurate statement. At first it may seem like a discouraging statement, but it's true. Just as God's Word proclaims, your life and mine are going to smell like something. That's the reality. Our lives are going to smell like something. They're going to give off an aroma that impacts what God smells and what other people around you smell. So when somebody says, my life stinks, what do they mean? I think most of us would interpret that as negative. Maybe the reality of sin that is plaguing their life is causing their life to stink. Maybe foolish decisions are causing their life to stink. Maybe a selfish attitude is causing their life to stink. Maybe foolish and life draining circle of friends or co-workers is causing life to stink. Or worse yet, maybe it's because there's no relationship with the Lord or with his church and it's causing their life  to stink. God wants you and I to come to our senses. He wants us to be mindful of the things that can cause our lives to stink spiritually, as well as the ways that our lives can be a fragrant aroma to him.
And to help us see this correctly, or should I say smell this? I created a special list and I know it's ten points. It's in your handout that you received. Don't worry, we're going to make it. We're going to make it. And I've entitled it The Stinky List. It's a simple way for you to remember this message and God's desire for you to always come to your senses. And this is by no means an exhaustive list, but one that I compiled over time is I had the chance to survey my own heart struggles, and also have the blessing and the privilege to do a lot of counseling at the church. So I get to see a lot of struggles that people bring in and the things that they're dealing with. And so this is very practical and by God's design, insightful for our continued growth and our sanctification. Did you know the only thing that you will take with you when you die? Well, we know your soul will depart, right? We know you'll get a new body eventually in the resurrection. The only thing that you take with you is your sanctification. That's what you did. That's what you take with you. That's your starting place. That's where eternal rewards are based out of. That's where the sum and substance of life is. And so praise the Lord. We get to have an opportunity today just to think about some things really, practically that impact the one thing that we actually get to take with us, our growth and maturity and our understanding of who God is. Praise the Lord.
1.  Well, let's get started with number one on the list. My life will be a stench if I do not know or follow the Lord. Proverbs 13:15. Well known to many, the way of the transgressor is hard. It's a hard life. This life in our fallen world is already filled with toil and pain due to sin. And the Lord knows this. In the Gospel of Matthew chapter 11, he invites all who are weary, all who are heavy laden, to come to him so that he can give them rest. It is a spiritual rest, calling every person to trust fully and completely in him alone for forgiveness and redemption. And then in Matthew 16:26, Jesus continues by asking for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? The Lord knows in our pursuit of happiness, success, and fulfillment, it's easy to become consumed by the things of this world. We chase after careers. We chase after reputations. We chase after possessions. It's true. Thinking that somehow they're going to bring us joy and meaning in this life. And Matthew 16:26 reminds us of a profound truth. No matter what we achieve, no matter what we acquire, it is utterly meaningless. It's vain if we do not have a true saving relationship with the Lord. Imagine a life built solely and completely on on worldly achievements: the corporate ladder, amassing an incredible amount of wealth, gaining extraordinary followership and popularity as an influencer, whatever it might be, without the gospel and a foundation rooted in a saving relationship with Christ, these pursuits will ultimately leave you feeling empty and unfulfilled. Worldly things we strive for quickly fade, and they can become burdensome, can't they? They exhaust us. They're life draining, and it can lead to a life filled with anxieties and dissatisfaction. And when we don't know the Lord, we miss out on the true purpose of our existence. Sinful pursuits blind us of our need for Christ. And without this vital relationship, we risk the reality of living a wasted life. There's a book titled Don't Waste Your Life by John Piper, actually tells the story of an 80 year old man who came up after one of the services and he had responded to the gospel, and he was sitting up in the front, and he had his head buried in his hands, and he was bawling. And you know what he kept repeating? I've wasted it. I've wasted it. I've wasted it. Powerful. 80 years old. And it's fitting, coming on the heels of Resurrection Sunday, the thief on the cross that died, that professed trust in Christ. Right? Lived a life of waste. Would we all agree up until that point? And yet God can and will redeem a situation. It's not wasted. We know where that 80 year old man is probably now, considering the time frame of when the book was written, perhaps he could still be alive. And if he is still alive and the book was written some 20 years ago, then that means that the Lord blessed him with additional time so that he could put a redeemed life on display. As you reflect on this verse, consider what you are investing in. Are you building a life that aligns with God's will of being discipled and making disciples? Or are you chasing after passing pleasures that will only leave you in want? I know how much my life stunk when I did not know or follow Christ, and many of you in Christ can testify to the same. God has called us, right? It's a command. It is. It is rooted in the Great Commission, right? The primary focus and the responsibility that he's given to us is to make disciples. And to help other people understand really why their life stinks and who it is that they're missing out on. My life will stink if I do not know or follow the Lord.
2. Our journey through the list continues. Let's look at number two. My life will be a stench if I do not fear God nor keep his commandments. Who can tell me who the Holy Spirit used to record Ecclesiastes?  Solomon. Yeah. You're right. You say it loud and proud. You're right, King Solomon. One of the wisest men to ever live. And most of us know that he was loaded with material possessions. He sinfully and selfishly had hundreds of wives and maidservants. And so, by the world's standards, he was in want for absolutely nothing. And Solomon is living proof that you can have plenty of wisdom in your head, and still fail to apply wisdom in your heart. Listen, you can have access to wisdom and still not fear God. And fearing God means recognizing his sovereignty, his holiness, and his authority over our lives. A godly fear is designed to shape our daily decisions, and without it we may find ourself dismissing or at least minimizing his holiness. Our flesh will open the door for us to be driven by sinful desires, rather than fearing God with a desire to honor him. It happened to Solomon. So let's not think that it couldn't happen to us. Solomon is the one who reflected on his life, who God used to pen these infamous words. The conclusion when all has been said and done, fear God and keep his commandments, because this applies to every person. A life without a healthy fear of God and adherence to his commandments stinks. On the other hand, when we fear God and commit ourselves to his instruction, we find stability and strength in him, don't we? It's true. Our lives become a reflection of his love and grace. We gain true wisdom and understanding, helping us to navigate life's challenges and make choices that align with his will. Heart question for you. Do you fear God? Do I fear God? If we don't, our lives will stink because sin will be residing in our hearts waiting for us to compromise. If you don't think that God takes sin seriously. I've shared this before. He flooded the entire planet and saved but all but eight people. And if you don't think that God takes sin seriously, that even in the end times, there's going to be a series of judgments that come, right?...trumpet, bowl, seal judgments. Events that are going to take one third of the earthly population away. When we love God, we love his holiness, and then we'll despise our sinfulness and fear him in a way that honors him. Fearing God, we're told in the Proverbs, is the beginning of wisdom. It's the beginning. And if you don't fear God, then you won't fear the effects or consequences of simple choices. Only a person captured by the holiness and wrath that God has toward sin will turn around and show fear and reverence. So I just ask you, as you ponder Ecclesiastes 12:13 with me, and I had a chance to do it this week. Are there any areas in your life where you may not be fearing God, where you may be disregarding his commandments? Is there sin in your walk that continues to compromise your spiritual health? That is a direct revelation about where your heart is and your posture is as it relates to fearing God, fearing God. When I disregard it and I yield to a temptation, I do not fear God in that moment. I need to repent of that. Embrace God's call to fear him and keep his commandments. Reach up to the Lord in repentance. Reach up to him. Reach out to others in life group or a discipleship group or a Bible study for accountability and it will help you to have victory.
3. Our stinky list continues with number three on the list, my life will be a stench if I do not have fruit of the Holy Spirit. Number three, to me, is perhaps the most disturbing and graphic. And to see the reality of just how unpleasant the stench of sin can be. Go to Galatians chapter 5 with me because it spells it out so clearly. It's good just to see the word. It's good just to read it. See it for yourself. Galatians chapter 5. Galatians. Ephesians. Starting in verse 16 of chapter 5. "But I say, walk by the Holy Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. For these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please. But if you are led by the spirit, you are not under the law. Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have, forewarned you, that those who make it their habit. Those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. Here in Galatians 5, the apostle Paul contrasts the life led by the Holy Spirit with one driven by our sinful flesh. And he emphasized two paths either we're going to walk in hopefulness and harmony with the Holy Spirit producing his fruit, or we succumb to the life draining desires of the flesh, resulting in a life filled with chaos and despair...or fruit of the flesh. And imagine living each day without the transformative qualities of the Spirit. And some may not have to imagine. Without love, we become distant and disconnected from God and others. Without peace, we experience turmoil and anxiety. Without patience and kindness, our interactions become strained and contentious. The absence of these fruits can make life feel heavy and draining, leading to feelings of hopelessness and despair. On the contrary, when we yield to the Spirit's work in our lives, we begin to reflect his fruit in our thoughts, in our words, and our actions. Walking in the power of the Holy Spirit enables us to respond to the daily challenges that we're going to face with grace and compassion. And so again, I ask you, and this is spiritual heart surgery that I performed on myself all week reflecting and preparing. So I think I know how you feel right about now, or at least I like to think that I know. It's got some, there's some weight here. There's some weight here for our growth. As we reflect on this passage, are there any specific areas where you struggle with those desires of the flesh mentioned in Galatians 5:16-21? Right? And I'm talking about patterns of sin in your life. Listen, we all get angry. We all, um, can be show an aspect of jealousy. I'm talking about patterns, ongoing patterns of sin that you see in your life. How has it caused your life to stink? God wants to help with that. God's got an answer for that. He does. The sweet fruit of the Holy Spirit stands in stark contrast with the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. I mean, those are the fruit. We name our kids after them. We have a Mercy, right? 100 bucks for the first person that names their person self-control. Okay, that's all I'm saying. I'll put it out there. I'm serious. I'll give you $100. If you name your child self-control. That would be. That would be fascinating. But I want you to notice verse 24 automatically assumes that we're going to put the deeds of the flesh to death. Why? Because life will absolutely stink if we don't.

4. Number four on the list. My life will be a stench if I do not apply the gospel of forgiveness in my relationships. By divine design, the gospel saves your relationship with God. But do you know what...God designed it to save your relationships with others? That's how it works. The gospel has saved my marriage with my wife, Victoria. The gospel has saved it because we practice forgiveness in our home, don't we? It saves our relationship with those who are close to us. It's allowed me to retain friendships because when I sinned against them, they forgave me. Or likewise, I have had to forgive them. The work continues. It's not just a one time message so that you can go to heaven after you die. God calls us to apply the gospel each and every day, and we see this spelled out for us so clearly in Ephesians 4:32 it says, be kind, tender hearted, and forgiving, just as the Lord Jesus Christ has forgiven you. You notice that progression there. Be kind. What is the importance of kindness? It keeps other people's hearts tender. And what will a kind, tender hearted person do? They forgive. They'll forgive. But you know what happens when bitter deeds of the flesh move in. And before you know it, you can have unkindness, hard heartedness and unforgiveness in your heart. You see it all the time in broken relationships, especially in the most sanctifying relationship, marriages. Right? We see it. In kindness. I don't know that there's a more underestimated and underappreciated fruit of the Holy Spirit than kindness. When properly understood, God's kindness leads us to repentance. It's kindness, and it's why it's so important. And you know, I get it. Killing each other with kindness makes a great sign at Hobby Lobby. And there's different kinds of kindness. There's this kindness that actually manifests itself through just being polite, having manners. Right? That's instilled in all people, not just the life of the Christian. That's not the kindness that I'm talking about here. I'm talking about the gospel fruit of being divinely enabled to be kind to people who sin against you. That is powerful. That is potent. And I have to say it as a warning, because if you can hear the sound of my voice, and if you're in any relationship or if you're in a marriage where you have now started to have this track record of treating each other unkindly. Oh my goodness. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when that relationship is going to be over unkindness, hard heartedness, unforgiveness. It will not last. So we need to see that. It's a divine fruit of the Holy Spirit that enables your heart to remain tender and forgiving. It's the true fruit. It's kind. And God wants us to be sweet smelling examples and to follow him. And what does Paul write in the very next verse after verse 32 of Ephesians? He says, therefore be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave himself up for us an offering and sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma. He leads us by example...his kindness, his tender heartedness towards us, his forgiveness. And so you can use this to evaluate your marriage. You can do this to evaluate your relationship with your kids. You can use this to evaluate your friendships with coworkers or classmates. Is there kindness there? Is there kindness? Look for it because it's going to keep their heart tender towards you and your heart tender towards them. And if we don't follow Christ's example, say it with me. My life is going to stink. Yes. You're listening. You're listening.
5. Number five on our list. My life will stink if I do not have discipleship and accountability. Proverbs 11:14, where there is no guidance, the people fall. But in abundance of counselors there is victory. And this proverb, of course, this maxim is true for everyone in the room. God designed us to be dependent disciples on Him and His guidance first, and to be dependent upon the wisdom of godly influences of leaders and teachers and disciplers. And when we fall into a pattern of sin, it is no different than falling off a ledge, Spiritually, it's going to hurt. It's going to hurt. The question is to what degree? Discipleship is designed to protect us, but in abundance of counselors, there is victory. Your translation might say safety, which I like too. When I was talking to our teenage students, I asked them if they've ever seen the videos where you see these, um, kids and some young adults doing these insane jumps right?  Off skateboards going down deep rails, some jumping off the side of buildings, trying to get to, um, ledges that are literally a couple stories lower down and to land successfully, many of which do not...getting horrifically injured. And for what? Views on TikTok. And is it really worth it to get paralyzed or severely injured for the rest of your life for views on TikTok? No it's not. That's foolish. Discipleship protects us from our foolishness and not only protects us physically, but relationally, spiritually, financially from making foolish and potentially life threateningchoices. Our biological DNA...probably should have Todd come up to explain it, but I'll give my best attempt, is our genetic code. It's what makes us up. It's what gives us life. You would not have life in this room right now, physically, if you did not have your DNA. Your deoxyribonucleic acid. Not bad. Huh? Some stuff sticks in there. I remember that from a long time ago when they taught us in science class, I really do. Spiritually, the same is true. There is no life in the body of Christ without spiritual DNA, without discipleship and accountability. Discipleship and accountability are by divine design. It is God's will for all of us to be discipled by Christ and to be discipled by others, to be accountable to Christ. Each of us will give an account to God, Romans 14:12. And to be accountable to others. Submit yourself to one another in the fear of Christ, Ephesians 5:21. It's his design. Who are you discipling? Who's discipling you right now? Who is holding you accountable spiritually in your walk, in your dating relationship or in your marriage? In your parenting? In your purity? These are Biblical questions. This shouldn't make anyone uncomfortable answering. They are basic questions in Biblical Christianity. It's our commission. It's designed. Discipleship paves the way to open up those doors to embrace the roles that God has ordained for us. And it turns around and it allows us to be a fragrant aroma to Christ. So say it with me. Without DNA, without DNA, my life is going to stink. Yeah, we're getting there.
6. All right. My life will be a stench if I do not honor authority. I think most of us understand that there are different God ordained authorities. And this will be more apparent when our passages are read in just a moment. The challenge we face isn't with authorities in place, but submitting to those authorities that challenges the hearts. We're okay with. I'm okay with lots of authorities. It's submitting to them when my heart gets challenged.  I want to read these two texts with you. And while we read them together, I want you to be sensitive to your heart response to the commands within them. Okay? I want you to see how you do. It's going to be fun. Hebrews 13:17, "Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they keep watch over your souls as those who will give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with grief, for this would be unprofitable for you." How did you do? Oh, it wasn't bad, right? Hope not. Did your heart struggle with any aspect of the commands to obey and to submit? I think most folks in our church understand that the elders here at the church and the ministry leaders that we have at HBC really do have your best interests in mind when it comes to your spiritual maturation and growth. But there can still be tension there sometimes, right? Let's be honest. Well, let's go ahead and let's just keep going a little bit. Now let's go to this next one. Okay. 1 Peter 2:13-20 proclaims, "submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution. Every human institution: government agencies, state and federal level. Submit yourself to them. Schools. Agencies. Police departments. Tracking with me. Right? This is what's in mind. And God's word is so amazing. He put institutions right. He knows every human institution. He knows that in different societies, there's going to be different reflections of authority, whether to a king as one in authority, or to governors sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and to the praise of those who do right. Okay, let's rephrase that. Whether to President Obama. Whether to President Biden. Whether to President Trump. Whether whatever governor has been ordained by God to oversee the state. Verse 15, for such is the will of God, that by doing right, you may silence the ignorance of foolish men. Act as free men, and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but use it as bondslaves of God. Honor all people. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king. Honor the president. Verse 18. Servants or employees, be submissive to your masters. Your bosses with all respect. Not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable. How are we doing now? A little bit harder, isn't it? And if we're being honest, there's probably some pushback rooted in your flesh. Your inner lawyer has just risen up to defend your heart because it's our sin nature to push back, be submissive to my boss even when they are being unreasonable? And all God's people said, no way. No way. Well, unreasonable when they asked me to stay later. And they know I have plans and or they put that stack of work on my desk at the last minute. We need verse 19. Look...for this finds favor if for the sake of conscience toward God, a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly, for what credit is there if when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it, you patiently endure it. This finds favor with God. And, seeing the divine order of submission is critical. It is mission critical. We know submission has gotten a bad rap right?...since the beginning of time, by the way. But when you see God's order of submission, it puts things in place because the Son submits to the Father and the Holy Spirit submits to the Father and the Son, and the church submits to God, and the elders lead the church and submit to God, and the members submit to the elders and submit to God. And then you have government which God has placed, and the governing authorities and families must submit to all those things. And then you have fathers submitting right?...to all those things, and then you have wives submitting to their husbands, and then you have kids submitting to their parents, and then you have animals that we were called to subdue the earth and have authority submitting to all of them. Sothere's some promise for you young kids that might be in the room. You do have authority over someone...your pet in the house. Okay. You do? I say that...you're laughing, but, hey, I want to give them a glimpse of hope right here. Otherwise, it seems like the decks are stacked against them. But isn't it so true that submission is such an ugly term? It's woven into the very fabric of the Godhead. It's woven into God's divine order of submission to all authority. And so if I do not submit to the authorities that God has placed over me, then say it with me, my life is going to stink. Are there any authorities currently in your life that you're struggling to submit to right now? Some teenagers in the room are tempted to say, yes, all of them. And you know, that wouldn't shock me. It wouldn't. Because our sin nature by default encourages our flesh to push back rather than submit. It just does. I was talking to two young men, had the privilege, both interested in going to the military. So we talked about this issue of authority. Right. Because you get orders and there's a lot of parallels serving God and country. Serving God and people in the church, there's parallels there. And so we just even talked about the authority of yielding to your parents. So how are you doing there? Well. Well. I don't know. What makes you think it's going to be different than when you go into the service, and then they ask you to do something. And I can share firsthand, because I am a military veteran, I went to West Point Prep. I was active duty. And I know that when I lived at home with my parents, they told me to clean my room and guess what? I had to clean it. And then when I lived at military prep school, guess what? They told me I had to clean my room and I cleaned it and it involved making hospital corners on my bed and all my shirts being measured exactly the same distance apart. Same with my shoes. It involved brass sewing buttons and pipes in the bathroom that no one would ever see. I wanted them to see it. Even my own heart this week. Uh, my wife's a school teacher, local Christian school. They had Grandparent's Day on Friday. Wonderful event, but parking is just absolutely crazy, so they had to make arrangements for that. Well, Friday there's coffee. Okay, there's $1 coffees. I'm giving this to you. This is a big time one. One of my favorite things. Lowes has boxcar coffee. You go there on Fridays. You can get $1 coffee any size, right? Really good. Freshly brewed coffee. $1 coffee. Enjoy it. You're welcome. And I went there and I texted my wife, and I just said, hey, would you like me to pick you and one of the teachers that she works with up a coffee, she's like, sure, that'd be great. And she even asked for an extra one that she was going to give to somebody else. So I fill up the coffees, I'm driving it there, and as I go into pull into the parking lot, I'm pulling into the parking lot at the school. There's a police officer in front going like this. Nope. Nope. So I roll down my window and already in my heart I'm like, there's no way I'm parking over at the high school and walking over with four things of coffee. I already had that going on in my heart. And I said, hey, my wife's a teacher at the school. I'm just here. I'm not here to park. I'm just here to drop the coffee off and leave. And he's like, sure, go ahead. He was reasonable. But what happens if he wasn't? I think you all get where I'm going with this. There's an opportunity there for me, isn't there? There's a divine appointed opportunity for me to yield and submit to that authority so that I can not only be a good testimony to that officer who's just trying to do a job. They asked him that no cars come into that lot, and if he said that, then so be it. And I'd have to my wife, whom I love and want to give her coffee anyway, walk, you know, a few extra minutes to get from from the high school. That's the reality of God's word for us submitting to the authority, isn't it? It isn't just part of a maturing process for Christians, but it's a true recognition of the divine order of submission that understands that our testimony can find favor in the sight of God and be pleasing unto him.

7. Number seven on the stinky list. My life will be a stench if I do not forsake my lusts and idols. Turn with me to 1 John, and we're going to hustle through these. I realize my time is disappearing on me. God's word uses explicit warnings about falling in love with the world in 1 John 2:15-17. The Lord had the apostle Paul. I'm sorry, not Paul...John record, "Do not love the world nor the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life is not from the father, but is from the world. The world is passing away, and also its lust. But the one who does the will of God lives forever." Evil lusts are really lies. I tell people that all the time in counseling. I've preached it from this pulpit before. It's good to write the lies of the flesh, the lies. If you're a Bible writer, write it in there. They're lies, that's what they are. And the lies of the flesh are sinful cravings for physical gratification, for comfort, for pleasure and indulgence. And we live in a world that often equates happiness with these passing pleasures. But then why don't these lies ever lead to fulfillment? Why do they always leave us so empty? Because they stink. Vicki. That's why. They stink. And the same is true of the lies of the eyes, which is an allurement of visual temptation. Coveting what others have, whether it's material wealth, beauty, or success. The world continues to lie to us. But true contentment, we know, is found in the Lord. Joy is found in a godly image, not a worldly one. The lies of pride tempt us to elevate ourselves above others, seeking recognition, status, and worldly influence. These lies encourage a culture that prizes achievement and self-promotion. We must remember that our worth is found not in our accomplishments, but in our identity in Christ. It's there. And this is why God's Word emphasizes, even in verse 17, the transient nature of this world. The world is passing away along with its desires. Listen, many selfish pursuits that consume our time and energy will ultimately fade away. And if you live for the lies of lust, say it with me. My life is going to stink. And these lies are so dangerous because if not dealt with, they eventually turn into idols that we worship. Our self-image instead of God's image, our net worth in this life instead of the riches of eternal life. And John closes the epistle by saying this, little children guard your selves from idols. Why? Because if you worship something else besides the Lord Jesus Christ. Say it with me. My life is going to stink.
8. We're on the home stretch. We're going to get a stink break. Okay. Um, after the final three on the list and I got to go fast. Number eight. My life will be a stench if I do not keep good company. Listen, if your friends stink, guess what? Your life will too. A bad company is like sailing in a boat full of holes. It is going down. And there's nothing that you're going to do to prevent that. And God's Word says, do not be deceived. In other words, don't think it will not happen to you. Bad company will corrupt...or you could translate it harm, destroy, pervert good morals. And so if you hang out with friends who think that it's okay to lie. Eventually, guess what? There's going to be an erosion of trust. If you hang out with a gossip, guess who is going to turn into one too? It's unavoidable. Now, to be fair to our context here. There were people in Corinth who were denying the resurrection, and it was having, um, or saying the resurrection of the dead already occurred and it was having a negative impact on believers. Yet the principle for us remains the same that we pull from here. Bad company likes to use peer pressure to force you into doing something, or believing something that you know doesn't honor the Lord. And that's why God's Word seriously warns us about keeping the wrong company. It's going to stink. Don't do it. Don't do it. Young people, evangelizing and witnessing to unbelievers is one thing, but friendships and negative influences that cause you to compromise your testimony is what's being called into question here. There's other friends...make some hard decisions. This is one of the hard decisions I remember as a young believer for 20 plus years ago, you know, had to give up a lot, forsake a lot of friendships. But the Lord has amply supplied tenfold.
9. All right, number nine on the stinky list. My life will be a stench if I do not make wise decisions. It's never God's will for us to make foolish decisions. Ephesians 5:17, do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. He wants us to take the wise path. That's his will for our lives. Ephesians 5:18 do not get intoxicated with wine. Okay, listen. Probably one of the greatest areas in counseling where I have a big burden and passion for guys who struggle with enslaving patterns of sin in the areas of alcohol and drugs. Painful...it will waste your life. It is the epitome of dissipation. But don't think that we can't get intoxicated with other things, right? Everybody can be intoxicated with different things: material possessions, shopping, amazon, the next delivery...addicting. It happens. And if I make foolish decisions, say it with me. My life is going to stink.
10. Ladies and gentlemen, drum roll for number ten on the stinky list. My life will be a stench if I do not walk in humility. And this is really the perfect bookend on this message. There are elements of pride when we yield to anything on this list. And this is why, 1 Peter 5, calls believers to clothe yourselves with humility toward one another. For God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Proverbs 16:18-19 provide a strong warning. Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before stumbling. It is better to be. It should say it is bitter to be prideful. It is better to be humble in spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud. How dangerous and damning is pride. Listen to what Jonathan Edwards writes. "Pride is the worst viper in the heart. It is the first sin that ever entered into the universe. It lies lowest of all in the foundation of the whole building of sin. Of all lusts, it is the most secret, deceitful, and unsearchable in its ways of working. It is ready to mix with everything. Nothing is so hateful to God, contrary to the spirit of the gospel or of so dangerous consequence. There is no one sin that does so much to let the devil into the hearts of saints and expose them to their delusions." End quote. If I could summarize that statement, I would say this. Pride is the ultimate stench to God's nostrils. Pride is the ultimate stench to God's nostrils.
Well, we began our message with the hope of covering two realities that will determine whether your life will be a stench or a sweet aroma. And so we only had the chance to cover. Reality number one. So I think that should mean that I should be able to come back next Sunday and do the remainder, although, um, I might be in serious trouble. Um, actually, I'm going to go ahead and just preach those second hour. So it's just going to be a combined. So it's going to be pretty full I know you're going to have to stay. I'm joking, I'm joking.
All we have to do is flip the script. Are you ready for this? All we have to do is flip the script. My life will be a fragrant aroma in Christ if I know and follow the Lord. My life will be a fragrant aroma, if I fear God and keep his commandments. My life will be a fragrant aroma, if I have fruit of the Holy Spirit, if I apply the gospel of forgiveness in my relationships, if I have discipleship and accountability, if I honor authority, if I forsake my lusts and idols, if I keep good company, if I make wise decisions, and if I walk in humility, my life will be a fragrant aroma.

So I leave you with an image that I want you to take with you, that will capture...kind of like the cliff notes of the stinky list. Can I do that? The cliff notes. I was watching a movie over Christmas break. Great movie if you haven't seen it...clean, great family movie. We don't usually endorse movies from the pulpit, but it's a faith based film called The Forge. Raise your hand. Anyone out there seen The Forge? All right. It's this, um, young guy in a broken family, and, um, he's playing video games, hanging out with the wrong friends, all this stuff not working. His mom's frustrated, right? There's a lot of anger built up because of the broken home. Just a lot of issues going on. So he finally goes out and he looks for a job. He goes in and applies at this company, and, um, he ends up meeting the owner of the company in the process. At first he was disrespectful of him. And then when he found out he was holding an application, I don't want to give too much of the film away. Long story short, is, um, there's a transformation in this kid's life, and his spiritual mentor gave him one of the best pieces of advice. I'm not kidding you that I have ever heard. He said to him, be a fountain, not a drain. Be a fountain, not a drain. I think all of us know what the what drains are like. I think of a sewer drain. Or I can think of our own kitchen sink drain and stuff, getting stuck in the disposal and pulling stuff out and the smell and just how foul all of it can be draining. But that's what our sin does. It drains us. It drains us. And he was trying to get the young man to say, don't be a drain on your mom anymore. Help around the house. Help financially. Do the things that you can pour in, be filled up. But I got to share this with you because he had to share it with him. You cannot be a fountain if you are not connected to THE fountain. You cannot be filled up and used and be a fountain if you're not connected to the fountain. So I say that for any person in here who's unsure about where they're at with their relationship with Christ. Maybe there's been a lot more drainage in your life than fountain life giving. Maybe you've been a lot more life draining. Are you in Christ? Are you truly born again so that you can be a fountain. Jesus says the very words...a fountain of living water will spring up within you. Right? Proverbs 4:23, watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flows the wellspring of life. That's why we look at this list. That's why we have to be attentive. That is what it looks like to be diligent and do the work on our hearts. So I want to leave that with you. And thank you all very much for allowing me to go a little bit longer. Thank you. Let's pray together.
Our father in heaven, we rejoice in just the comprehensive nature of your word. And you had all this in mind when you thought of our sanctification. You knew, um, you were going to do a work not just in justification, But that as you caught fish, as you caught people, um, they were going to be cleaned. And there's a process that takes place. I pray for everyone who was here today that you would allow them to continue to meditate on the reality of the stinky list, and to consider the aroma of their own life, and, Lord, that you would use it in great measure to help them understand and see. Are they truly born again? And what are some areas where sin is actually draining them spiritually? Help them to address it. Help them to be a fountain in that area instead. May kindness continue to pervade our homes through the power of the gospel. We rejoice in everything that you're doing. We give you thanks and praise in Christ's name. Amen.

The Resurrection of Jesus Christ

Pastor Adam Ashoff

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The Resurrection of Jesus Christ

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Well. It is a privilege and joy to open God's Word with you this morning. Turn to John chapter 20. Uh, this is a particularly special Sunday as we look at the resurrection of Jesus. It was our own, I guess we'll call him a local legend down in Charlotte, Billy Graham, who said, if I did not believe that Christ rose bodily from the grave, I would quit preaching. Amen. Kurtis mentioned it earlier because Paul said it If Christ is not raised, our preaching is in vain. Your faith is worthless because you're still in your sin. That's where we left off Friday night when Jesus said, it is finished on the cross. What is the last proof of evidence that that actually went through? That it was paid in full. And if Christ is not raised, we're not convinced by the text in front of us today, then what are we actually doing here? If there ever is a time and a place to be reminded of the wonderful Catechism, what is our only hope in life and death? It's Christ. That he lived and he died, and he rose again. It's found in John 20. So if you have a Bible, follow along. If you don't, check the seat back in the chair in front of you for a copy. This is arguably the most important chapter in the Bible. The resurrection of Jesus Christ. It holds it all together, and it deserves our full attention today. And I will read it in its entirety starting in verse one.
"Now, on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb while it was still dark, and saw the stone already taken away from the tomb. So she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and said to them, they have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him. So Peter and the other disciple went forth, and they were going to the tomb. The two were running together, and the other disciple ran ahead faster than Peter and came to the tomb first. And stooping and looking in, he saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. And so Simon Peter also came following him and entered the tomb. And he saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the face cloth which had been on his head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself. So the other disciple, who had first come to the tomb, then also entered, and he saw and believed. For as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead. So the disciples went away again to their homes. But Mary was standing outside the tomb weeping. And so as she wept, she stooped and looked into the tomb, and she saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been lying. And they said to her, woman, why are you weeping? And she said to them, because they have taken away my lord, and I do not know where they have laid him. When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, and did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking? Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus said to her, Mary. She turned and said to him in Hebrew, Rabboni, which means teacher. Jesus said to her, stop clinging to me, for I have not yet ascended to the father, but go to my brethren, and say to them, I ascend to my father, and your father, and my God, and your God. Mary Magdalene came announcing to the disciples, I have seen the Lord, and that he had said these things to her. So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were shut where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, peace be with you. And when he had said this, he showed them both his hands in his side. The disciples then rejoiced when they saw the Lord. So Jesus said to them again, peace be with you, as the Father has sent me, I also send you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them. If you retain the sins of any, they have been retained. But Thomas, one of the 12 called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples were saying to him, we have seen the Lord. But he said to them, unless I see in his hands the imprint of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe. After eight days his disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, and the doors, having been shut, stood in their midst and said, peace be with you. Then he said to Thomas, reach here with your finger, and see my hands. And reach here your hand and put it into my side. And do not be unbelieving but believing. Thomas answered and said to him, my Lord and my God. Jesus said to him, because you have seen me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see and yet believed. Therefore, many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book. But these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name."
Thus reads the Word of God. The grass withers and we are like grass, and the flower fades, but the Word of God endures forever. Amen.  
There is such an extraordinary nature to John 20. After spending time in it this last week, I could close my eyes and I could see it play out. It is arguably the most beautiful depiction of all the depictions of the resurrection, the movement between the different witnesses and then where it ends. The power of it is so much so it feels rather electric, which we should expect it to feel that way. If it is a true story about a man rising from the dead. It's beyond imagination. We have those moments in our lives where something so amazing happens to us, or that we are part of that we witness an unforgettable event and nothing can take it from our memory. There's some electricity still left in that moment when we conjured up in our minds, maybe as a child, some amazing experience of being the hero of the game. Maybe it was the time you met eyes across the room or the first date. Maybe it was graduating from high school or college being the first one in your family to do so. Maybe it was the engagement day or the wedding day. Maybe it was the birth of your first child. Maybe it was when the Steelers beat the Cardinals in Super Bowl 43. February 1st, 2009. Those moments are unforgettable. When we read John 20, it has such an amazing appeal that nothing and no one can take it away from us. Even a communist naysayer like Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin couldn't stop it one day in 1930. At the time, he was one of the most influential men on earth. A Russian revolutionary. A contemporary serving under Lenin and then Stalin, who took part in the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. It was in 1930 he went on a trip from Moscow to Kiev to address a massive crowd on the topic of atheism and its merits. Inevitably, it quickly turned into an all out assault on Christianity, and he, a genius in his own right, argued against the faith skillfully. At the end of his talk, he was confident that he had convinced the crowd that they should embrace atheism. So he turned to the audience and boldly opened it up to any questions. Deafening silence filled the auditorium. That is, until an Orthodox priest went up to the platform. He looked at the crowd and then shouted the ancient greeting. Well known in the Russian Orthodox Church, Christ is risen! And at once the crowd stood up and responded, he is risen indeed! What can give a beleaguered people like that such deep rooted conviction in such an unexpected situation? The New Testament has a clear and simple answer. It’s true. Those people, just like disciples and just like you today, believed with all their heart that the tomb was empty and that Jesus had risen from the dead. And people for two millennia have believed Jesus has risen from the dead for the simple fact that he did. My prayer today is that as we walk through this account from John the Apostle, the writer of this gospel, and eye witness to these historical events of seeing the risen Lord, it will have the same encouraging, convicting, invigorating effect that has had for all the ages who are disciples of Jesus. And we will look at the resurrection of Jesus from the eyes of four sets of people today. And I believe if we simply observe what they heard, saw, felt, and responded, we will find ourselves overwhelmed in joy with the most amazing day in history that changed all of humanity.
So first, let's first talk about John and Peter and what they experienced as they race to the tomb that day in verses 1 to 10. The full title of this painting, the disciples Peter and John running to the sepulchre on the morning of the resurrection, was by a little known Swiss artist named Eugene Burnand, 1898 it was his best known work. I love how one Christian art critic put it. The picture crackles with kinetic energy. It is a study in desperate anticipation. Surely is also the posture with which we should approach Easter leaning in, wringing our hands, clutching our chests, desperate for it to be true. Verse one. It was the first day of the week, and Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb while it was still dark, and saw the stone rolled away. John brings us into his energized testimony that morning with a quick survey of the action. It's the first day of the week in Jewish counting of days. They don't name them, but it would be Sunday for us. And by the way, in case you've ever wondered, why is today the day we gather? It's this reason established in early church tradition. The Lord's Day is the first day, and from that time till now, Sunday is the day we gather. Mary comes early to the tomb, and you're wondering if you know the other gospels, where are the other women? John doesn't mention them by name. Mind you, he is telling this account. 40 to 50 years after it happened and he's not getting into the minutia. But we do know the other women were there in accordance with the other accounts because of Mary's response in verse two. Do you see what she says? They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we. The other women were with her. It's just in John's retelling of this event. He wants the focus to be on Mary, because he's going to return to her eyewitness testimony later. She sees the stone rolled away and hotfoots it in verse two to John and Peter to break the bad news. And so then in verses 3 to 5, John humbly recounts he is the other disciple in this story with Peter. He recounts that he outruns Peter in verse four. We don't know why he ran ahead faster, whether it was excitement or it was his age. Some believe he was younger than the older Peter, but for whatever reason, he gets there first and he stoops and looks in. It's the vision they want to give you. He wants to give you that. James 125 uses the same phrase when it says, we are to look intently into the law of Christ, the law of liberty, and by looking into it, you are blessed by it. That's this word. It's a close examination. And he saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. In bursts peter. Right by him. Verse six. I actually picture Pastor Kurtis and John Crick. Kurtis, of course, would outrun John to the tomb. Speed wins. But you know, our former All-American D lineman would blitz right past Kurtis and burst his way into that tomb, excited, taking in everything around him. That's how I picture this. I actually was trying to figure out, could I with the use of AI or something, get Kurtis and John's face on that picture so young people figure it out. We would love to see a recreation of that wonderful painting with our beloved elders. The detail that John keeps repeating that he wants us all not to miss is what changed it for him. It was three times repeated. Seeing the linen wrappings, he writes that he saw them in verse five. But then Peter who gave a closer examination by busting right in and getting up close, sees not just those linen wrappings. He sees the head wrapping rolled up in a place by itself. The detail gets mentioned because John wants us to know this was it for him. Maybe Peter at first or John at first missed that detail, and then Peter's close examination made him see it and believe it. Believe what? That Christ had risen. He saw and believed. That's the most important line in this first account, that the linen wrappings and the head covering did something to trigger in John his latent faith. The faith that, yes, has been dulled in the three days since Jesus died. Dulled to what? Christ's words. His prediction. John, of course, believed in Jesus. We know this. Just looking back to Thursday night because Jesus says it about he and the other disciples when he is washing Peter's feet. And he says to all of them, he who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean. And you speaking to the disciples, except not all of you, not the one who would betray me. But he says, all of you are clean. And then he repeats it in John 15. Verse three, you speaking to those 11 who were still there, Judas has left the building. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. So John is not speaking here of his saving faith, but there was something in his faith that had been dulled since the death of Christ. And what's the reason for it? Well, he tells you in verse nine, speaking as himself and Peter, as yet they did not understand the Scripture that he must rise again from the dead. That was the missing piece. But when he saw it, it all came together for him. Alluding back to John 2:22 when Jesus and the first Passover goes to the temple, and he clears the temple out, and the Jews say to him, what sign do you show to us as your authority for doing these things? And he says, destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. And the Jews said, it took 46 years to build this temple, and you will raise it up in three days. But he was speaking of the temple of his body. And listen to this John 2:22. This is when it clicks for Peter or for John when he remembers this in The Empty Tomb. John 2:22. So when Jesus was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken. This is the moment it all came together for John. It was held together by believing in the word of Christ without even seeing the body of Christ. What does Romans 10 tell us? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. It was the scripture John had to recall. The events of the last two days, had yes, put a little bit of a fog in front of his thinking. Just the same was true with Peter. Luke 24:12 says that he went away from this occasion wondering what happened. But here is the wonder and amazement of John's reinvigorated belief he hadn't seen the risen Lord. He is actually unique in all the eyewitness accounts. He's the only disciple that didn't need to see him in order to believe. He just needed the words to come back. And all it took was the empty tomb and linen cloths to trigger that. Friends, true believer, what is it that enlightens your dull heart the most. Is it not the Word of Christ, the living and active Word of God, used by the spirit, his sword, to divide us up to the most intimate part of us, soul and spirit, when we have grown dull in the faith and our affections for Christ, and even believing. Is it all true? It's the Word of God. Psalm 19 says it's pure. It enlightens the eyes. It allows us to see again. That's the first eyewitness account we get. We need God's word to wake us up, even this morning, do we not? And the true believer knows that. The times where we are most glazed over to the glory of God and the work of Christ in our lives. Go back to His word and trust him to do it.  
So we start with our look into the resurrection, with a word on an empty tomb and the faith that can ensue, but from a dulled disciple now to a discouraged disciple, let's see how faith comes alive in Mary and what she experienced as she waited around for answers. Another depiction of this is by Rembrandt called Christ and Saint Mary Magdalene at the tomb from 1638. Surprisingly enough, he sticks close to the passage with some of the detail. Critics of it noting Christ's appearance as purposely vague. And I could see it in all your eyes. You're like, what? Who in the...why is Jesus wearing a sombrero? That clearly would have thrown Mary and all of us off? But it's her twisted posture, symbolic of the painful view she had of the reality and the darkness right before the dawn, Half in the light, half in the dark. When her faith comes alive. And that is the shift of the scene we have in verse 11, the disciples go away on somewhat of an excited high. Even though Peter was wondering, he was amazed, according to Luke account, John believed. So we leave off on something good to go to something dark. Verse 11. Mary, we don't know how long she was standing outside the tomb weeping, and as she wept she, same language of John, same language of Peter, stooped and looked into the tomb. She doesn't notice the clothes. It says she saw two angels sitting, one at the head and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus was lying, had been lying. Quite different what people can notice in their times of despair and dullness, isn't it? Had the angels been there when Peter and John ran in? We don't know. But they were there for when Mary goes in, and that's what she sees. They ask a question, woman, why are you weeping? And she says to them, because they've taken away, my lord, and I do not know where they have laid him. Her answer reveals very clearly her hope at that moment was not in a risen Lord. Zero. Was she a woman of faith? Yes. But like Peter and John, she did not understand the piece of the puzzle that was the resurrection. She was in despair. She was despondent. She turns around. She senses someone is in the room, and she sees Jesus standing. But she doesn't know it's him. She got a good look at him. Some sense of sentimentalism would carry on that she couldn't see him through her tears, maybe. I don't think the focus anymore is on her tears. When she sees him and doesn't recognize him. She was in her right mind enough to keep her mind on the same thing, right? She just wanted to know one thing. Where is the body? She sticks to that. That's the first thing she's worried about when she's told the disciples back in verse two. It's what she tells the angels, and it's what she says back to Jesus in verse 15 when he asks, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking? You know, I wonder, in whom are you seeking? Is that Jesus trying to kind of wake her up a little bit? But she sticks to her guns. Sir. She's honorable in that response. If you've carried him away, tell me where you've laid him. She thinks he's the gardener. I think that's why Rembrandt in the picture had him holding a shovel. And the sombrero. It's likely that she did not recognize him because of his glorified state. It seemed to be the same case for the disciples on the Emmaus Road in Luke 24. All that said, like John, something else, even beyond the appearance of the risen Christ, would have to break the spell of despair. Mary broke the spell of despair. He called her name. The beauty of the narrative at this point is that John doesn't overexplain the tone of his voice or the familiar sound. Whatever it was about Jesus saying, Mary, it worked. And you can draw so many soul encouraging implications from that, can't you, believer? Yes. The personal call of Jesus to the brokenhearted is everything. I hope some of you can latch on to that today, because some of you are brokenhearted. You are in despair. You're depressed. You're despondent. There are many things that can help you in that. But there is only one who can heal you of that. It's Christ. It's Christ himself. All the work we do laboring in discipleship and counseling and pointing people to hope there isn't anything better that we can do for you this morning than point you to Jesus Christ Himself. We see the change it makes in Mary. Right away she responds back Rabboni, which is an honorable title of master and teacher and Lord. And then she calls to him, and then she clings to him. I can relate. When I'm gone for a little amount of time, one of the best things about coming home is Shannon coming and giving me a hug. And she just doesn't let go. And then the kids come and jump up on Dad, and they jump up on dad now just to get something from me, but they used to jump up on dad. Just wanted to hold me for a little bit. So we get what's going on here and we know what's going on here because Jesus says, stop clinging to me. And it's not a harsh rebuke because of what he says after. Here's why you can't stay with me, Mary. The moment this is okay, but I haven't yet ascended to the Father. What's he saying there?  I must go back to heaven. I've told you this all along, but go to my brothers and say to them. So here's your mission, Mary. I ascend to my Father and your Father and my God. Your God. What's he saying there? Why this response? There's a lot of speculation, but the most simple is that he's reminding her of what he's been saying all along. I must return to my Father in heaven. I promised I would send you something even greater, the indwelling Holy Spirit, to fill all of you to fulfill my mission. Same God, same team. For the sake of the gospel. To the ends of the earth. Ready? Break! That's what he's doing there. ?. This is what you do from this point on. Just like it was in Acts. We're not standing around looking into heaven. We're activated and empowered to do what? Go tell the world about Christ that he's risen. So she's the first one with that mission. And Mary. So awesome. She does it right away. Verse 18, no break in the action. She comes announcing to the disciples, I've seen the Lord. He's risen and all that he had said to her. Unlike John, she did need to see the risen Lord for her faith to come alive again. But even seeing him, she needed. What? The Word, the reminder. The call. Mary, you know me. Come on. Get out of that funk that you're in and get to work. Get to work. The same courageous drive that had kept her at the cross. That had kept her coming back to the tomb, now sends her from brokenhearted to bold faith. It's the call of Christ. It's the Word again. Seeing him and hearing him, and that doing something in her despondency breaks the spell and off she goes. Christ does that for you, believer.  
Last person to note today the infamous Doubting Thomas, part of a group of doubters to boot. Now, you probably knew this picture was coming. Um, my personal favorite was the first one of Peter and John. But this is probably the most well-known of the three. The goat of the resurrection paintings done by Michelangelo Caravaggio in 1603, called The Incredulity of Saint Thomas. The. The poignancy of the image itself takes us back. But what is noted about this painting is the contrasts, the contrasts. The shadows of doubt that sweep over Thomas. But the closer he is to Christ, he's not drawn back into the light of faith. Well, that basically exegeted this last section so we can move on. Just kidding. The truth is, this whole scene, 19 to 29, isn't just about Doubting Thomas, it's the whole group. He gets singled out from the group only because he wasn't there. That first Sunday, verse 19, when Jesus appears, we don't know why he wasn't there. We know from earlier appearances in the Gospel of John. Back in chapter 11. When Jesus finds out that Lazarus is dead and, it's amazing what Thomas of all the disciples says in response to. I'm glad for your sakes that I was not there so that you may believe. Let's go to him, the dead one. And, Thomas, in some loyal expression of I don't know what. Says to the other disciples, let us also go so that we may die with him. He doesn't quite know what he's even saying there. What he's getting into there. He's just going, hey, if this is what Christ says, I'm with him. That's the. Uniqueness of Thomas. Also, we hear from him in John 14 when Jesus says, don't let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God. Believe in me. I'm going away to prepare a place for you. And when I go, I'll come again and receive you to myself. And you know the way where I am going. And Thomas says to Jesus, Lord, we do not know where you are going. How bold. He just says, you know the way I'm going. No we don't. But this is the heart of Thomas. How will we know the way? Like he wants to stay close to you. Do you get that about Thomas? So maybe that broadens our view of this doubter. That when he isn't there in the upper room that night, the other disciples are. Maybe it's because he was the most devastated of them all. He's gone and I'm gone. And he's some lone wolf howling at the moon by himself. Because he just wanted to be with his Lord still. But my guess would be, judging by his response in 24 to 29, that had he been there that night, he would have responded the same way as them. So hence, I think it's a bunch of doubting disciples. They had the door shut for fear of the Jews. I mean, they had been told earlier in the day by Mary. The disciples had heard, he's risen. And do you see any of those other disciples running out into the streets looking for the risen Christ? No, there was doubt in all of them. So he comes and says, peace to you, but let's move forward to the but Thomas moment in verse 24. An inauspicious start. Like with Mary. He is pessimistic and obtuse to a degree, as one commentator called him. And I can resonate with that. I think I would have had a similar response. If I wasn't there to see it and believe it. Partly because it could be too good to be true. And you didn't want to get your hopes up too high, right? I want to see him for myself. So verse 25, he makes the claim, the famous claim heard round the Christian world. Until I see in his hands the imprint of the nails. And put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe. So Eight days later, Sunday to Sunday. Counting those days, it's the Lord's day. They're inside again. The door is still shut. You know. Bold faith, right? No, they're still scared. But he's there this time and in repetitious style. The disciples are inside. The door is shut. Jesus appears in their midst and he repeats, peace be to you. It's interesting to note the repetitioncost of first classstamp 2025 of the peace be with you. Third time it's mentioned. The peace be to you coming after the "it is finished". Romans 5:1. Having been justified, you have what? What do you have? You have peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. Justification by the atoning work of Christ on your behalf. Finishing it on the cross. Your sins paid for in full. First thing, you get out of that. Peace with God. Do you see the connection? So the great last words at the cross it is finished. Lead into the first words to the disciples. Peace to you. Verse 27. And then he goes right to Thomas. Hey, Guy, were you the one that wanted to see me in person? Go ahead. Reach here with your finger and see my hands. And reach here your hand and put it into my side. He's saying it word for word. You know, it never says that. Thomas did it. Sorry, Caravaggio. We don't get that detail in the text. I think that this was enough for Thomas just to know that the Lord knew. The Lord knew his doubt. The Lord knew his doubt, word for word. And he invites him. Bring me your doubts. I'm right here. What is it you need from me? You know I'm still with you. Just like I said I would be. His words again. Producing faith. Faith that had doubts. You know, it reminds me of a passage in the beginning of John. If you turn to John 1, there's a similar dialogue between a doubting disciple and Jesus. But it's at the beginning of the story, not the end. It's when a disciple named Nathaniel, also a pessimistic and obtuse disciple, if you want to call him them that. And Jesus has revealed himself as the Lamb of God sent to take away the sin of the world, he's invited disciples to hang out with him. And then Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, goes, we have found the Messiah and brings him to Jesus. And the next day they go into Galilee and Jesus says, follow me. And Philip finds Nathaniel and says, we found him who Moses in the law and the prophets wrote Jesus of Nazareth, Nazareth. And Nathaniel says, in that cynical, doubting attitude, can any good thing come out of Nazareth? So Jesus looks at him and commends him, hey, there's an Israelite indeed. In who? There's no deceit, no guile. You're a straight ahead guy, Nathaniel. You want the facts? You're not here for the fluff. And so Nathaniel calls him on it. How do you know me? And Jesus answers and says, before Philip called you when you were under the fig tree, I saw you. Oh. How did you see me? So he answers him. And it's the one of the first great confessions. Rabbi, you are the Son of God. You are the king of Israel. See the connection here. See what John is doing masterfully in his story. Doubts at the beginning that all Jesus had to do was meet Nathaniel right in those doubts and bring them to the forefront. What is he doing here at the end? He's meeting Thomas right in those doubts, and he's drawing them out, not shaming him for them. And then he says, and so don't be unbelieving. But believing in Thomas answers, just like Nathaniel's great confession, he has a great confession, my Lord and my God. Amazing. Another disciple goes from a weak faith, a flickering and smothered faith where the fires seem to be dying out. But in a blaze of Christ's revealed glory, he reignites Thomas's heart to burn until you pull all these things together. In all three cases, each one was different. Dulled faith. Despondent faith and doubting faith. All it took was the word of Christ. All it took was him appearing to them, two of them out of the three, and speaking to them. And then he, that is, John captures this amazing line in verse 29, Jesus said to him, because you have seen me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see and yet believed. He uses this moment, this line of Christ, to summarize not just this amazing resurrection account, but his entire gospel to this moment. When he says in verse 29, because you have seen me, you believe. He's not saying that's a bad thing. Why does John want to highlight this? It's because it's the whole point of which he wrote his gospel. It's the Book of signs. The Apostolic Witness was built on the evidence of Jesus' life, death and resurrection. They saw it. They were the ones who witnessed the risen Lord, the apostles. So seeing to believe was a big part, the biggest part of these men taking the gospel message all over the world. Most of them were willing to die for it. So there's nothing wrong for them to have to see to believe. It's what the Apostolic Witness was we saw. What does John say at the beginning of his epistle? What does he start with? That which was from the beginning, which I saw with my own eyes and touched with my hands the Word of life that never got away from him. The reality, the fact that he saw Jesus Christ risen from the dead. But here's the remarkable thing John does in this moment, in verse 29, He takes that last line. Blessed are they who did not see and yet believe. And the camera zooms out on that last line in the upper room, and it starts to turn. And it's no longer on the disciples. It's on you and it's on me. He pulls you in to this discussion. Blessed are they who did not see and yet believe. That's talking about us 2000 years later, sitting in a comfy chair in Hickory. We are those who will hear and believe. Even though we didn't see. And he says you are blessed. What does that mean? Doesn't mean you got a great parking spot this morning. So blessed. Or that if I end early, you will beat the crowds to Golden Corral. Double blessed. The word blessed means. You are favored by God and that you have saving faith. That's the ultimate blessing to be favored by God in his grace, to find you and call you and bring you out of darkness and into the light. That's the blessing that those who would not see and yet believe would have eternal life. This is the brilliant way John ends this gospel. He's thinking of you. Someone in the future with the opportunity to hear about Jesus, the Son of God, who came to take away the sin of the world. So that's why, way back in chapter one, he started telling Jesus' story as the Word that was with God and that was God. And now we get to the end and he ties it together with a disciple who confesses what, my Lord and my God. This is what he was moving up to. This point is to turn it on you, the reader. And in verse 30 he says it. This is what I was trying to do. All the other signs Jesus performed in the presence of the disciples. I couldn't fit them all in here. I gave you a bunch of them. I didn't give you all of them, but that's why I wrote this witness, this account. I wanted you to see and believe he did everything that God would do coming to earth. But the miracles, all of the wonderful things he did, the turning the water into wine and to the healing the sick, and to helping the blind to see and to raising Lazarus from the dead. They were all signs to point to what? To point to him? That he was Lord. That he was God. But he saved the greatest sign for last, didn't he? Right here. The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. The empty tomb, the folded linens, the transformed disciples. All of it. A sign all remembered and recorded for you to see. Verse 31. Friend, put yourself in it. Read your name here. These have been written so that Adam would believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. Put your name in it. These were written so Dave would believe, and he did. And that Tom would believe, and Tim would believe. Is your name in there because you've believed? That's why this is here. It's not just a history story today. It is fact. But it's to produce what faith that you would believe that Jesus is everything he said he was, the Son of God. And by believing you'd have life in his name. Do you have life in his name today? It's not something I could give you. I can plead. And that's all I'm called to do, is to be a proclaimer of it. But I can't show you Christ. I can't make him appear. He's got to speak to you through his Word right now, where you sit and you believe the word of Christ being preached to you or you don't. And if you don't believe the opposite is true in verse 31, you will not have life in his name. There is only one name by which men or women may be saved. It's Jesus Christ. To believe in the name is to believe everything about him today. You may not know everything about him today. I mean, you saw it in the lives of Peter and John and Mary and Thomas. They had faith, but they just didn't know the whole story. But it was enough to save, you know, enough of Christ to be saved. Today, sitting there where you are, the only thing holding you back is your unbelief. And those who don't believe. He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will not see life. This gospel call this proclamation that Jesus Christ is Lord is not just an idea. It's an imperative. It's a command. You must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved. And if you do not obey the call of the gospel on you this morning, you will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on you. That's a very sobering reality. Do you believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, sent to take away the sin of the world? Christ right now offers himself to you through the gospel for you to receive him by faith. How do you do that? Confess two things. That you're a sinner. And you call on him a savior. So wonderfully put by Thomas, my Lord and my God. Do you know him as your Lord and your God? He said, my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. It's not about me calling you to faith today. It's about Christ's call on you to faith. Look to the Lord and be saved. Now for all y'all who know him as Lord today. It is true the Gospel of John has, of all the Gospels, the most evangelistic aim. But there is something for you, the believer today, not just for your faith to be reinvigorated. I want to remind you of your job by a section I skipped over verses 21 to 23. They looked like the most difficult verses in this chapter because they are. But what do they mean? We shouldn't overcomplicate it. He comes in, he says, peace to you as the Father has sent me, I also sent you. So anything you're going to try to understand after that, you got to understand through this. This is the first fruits of the great commission of the great Activation of Acts where he's saying, look, the father sent me on a mission I send you. What was Jesusmission? John 4:34. My food is due to the will of him who sent me to accomplish his work. Did he do it? He accomplished it. He died on the cross. It was finished. He rose again for our justification. It's time he goes back. So after that, then here's where everybody's. What is going on in verse 22 to 23, when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. He's doing something symbolic in this moment. The Holy Spirit, Word itself. The idea was wind, breath. So he breathes on him and he says, Receive the Holy Spirit. It's a first fruit of what the fullness was going to be at Pentecost. And clearly they were not filled to the full because they didn't really get after it until Pentecost, did they? The boldness, the activity, the preaching. It didn't happen here. It happened there. And then verse 23, he says, not only am I going to empower you, but here's your message forgiveness of sin, verse 23, that's what that's about. You are proclaimers of the gospel. And at the heart of the gospel is a simple message the Son of God who came into the world to save sinners. You can have your sins forgiven. That's verse 23. He's not saying you personally will forgive people's sins. You will, on behalf of Christ, proclaim the gospel. And people could say, my sin. Yes, your sins could be forgiven. How could you possibly say that you don't have the ability to forgive sins? No, I don't have the ability to forgive sins. But I can tell you who does. I'm a proclaimer. So are you. So he basically says to those disciples, there, you got one job. Preach the gospel. Tell people they can be forgiven. You know what, friends? That's the mission of all of us, though. It just doesn't rest on those first disciples. It's our job, and it's more than a mission. What is it? It's a privilege, isn't it? It's an honor. It's a joy that we get to tell others the greatest news there is that sinners can be saved. You have the power of the resurrection life of Christ in you. You have the presence of the Holy Spirit in you with all of his graces and gifts. You have the perfect and inspired Word of God to instruct you. You have the partnership of the Body of Christ to go with you. If you think of what we have today with what the disciples had then, you know there's only one thing we do not have. The excuse not to do it.  
Let's pray. Father, we thank you that we have been saved and set apart and sent even if we stay here. We have the greatest news in the world. And we pray this morning that by the work of your Spirit and the Word, that the resurrection of Christ reinvigorates in our own lives, in our own hearts, a passion to tell, to not stand around. To not cling, but to go and to preach and to teach and to start a Bible study on our streets or in our school, or start within our own home with our kids, that we would be invigorated by the truth of the resurrection that Christ you live. And so we live as well, and we live for you. Help us to do that today. We ask in your name, Christ. Amen.