Two Journeys

Jesus was born in obscurity and raised to glory in his death and resurrection, fulfilling the prophets' prophecies.

The post The Kingdom of Christ: From Obscurity to Glory appeared first on Two Journeys.

Christmas Eve devotional on the faithful vigil of Simeon anticipating the coming of the Messiah and his encounter with baby Jesus in the temple.

If you have a copy of the scriptures, you can turn to Luke chapter two. I'm going to be kind of briefly walking through verses 21-35 or you can just listen along. As I was meditating on this passage, the word that captivated my mind was the word vigil. Vigil. Now vigil is a patient watchfulness, an eager watchfulness waiting for something to come. Tonight, of course, is Christmas Eve and so all over the world, Christians are in a form of vigil waiting for tomorrow's celebration of the birth of Christ. Now vigils are all about eagerness, about anticipation, waiting for something you expect, something perhaps delightful, something you're yearning for. Now, the children of the world who have some idea what is likely to happen tomorrow are alive with sparkling anticipation of Christmas and all its delights. As the song says, "They will find it hard to sleep tonight."

I remember the transition I made from childhood to adulthood is when all I wanted out of Christmas Eve was a good night's sleep, and I knew I was no longer a child. But when I was a child, I couldn't sleep for anticipation. The vigil would go on much of the night. Children expect their Christmas dreams to come true with gifts and sweets, and love that they're going to discover tomorrow. Now in our brief devotional tonight, we're going to focus our minds on a fascinating person, person who we meet only in this one text who doesn't come up again in scripture. A man who spent the last portion of his entire life in a faith-filled vigil eagerly watching and waiting for the Christ to be born. That man is Simeon, and we're going to learn from his faith-filled vigil in its marvelous fulfillment. But Simeon's experience is part of an overall work, the overall ministry of the Holy Spirit to reveal Jesus Christ to a lost and dying world.

It is the Spirit's unique work to reveal Jesus to the world. Without the Spirit's work of revelation, we will never see Christ by faith or receive his salvation. So from the moment of the fall into sin in the Garden of Eden, the Holy Spirit began doing that work, revealing the Messiah, the Savior, who would come in the future. Any believer who understood the words God spoke in the garden would begin their vigil for the seed of the woman who would come along one day and crush the serpent's head and bring salvation to Adam's doomed children. As history unfolded, the Spirit began to reveal Christ more and more to God's faithful people. His revelations fueled that eager watchfulness, that is the essence of the vigil I'm describing tonight. The Spirit promises Christ, some details or aspects of Christ, believers here, they understand the word and they watch and they wait, the vigil begins.

As Jewish history unfolded, the Spirit revealed more and more of the details of Christ's saving work. God called a pagan man named Abram out of Ur of the Chaldeans and led him on a lifelong pilgrimage of faith. And as he called him, he spoke an amazing promise to him, "Through your offspring, all peoples on earth will be blessed." Abraham eventually taught his family that promise and all who believed it began a vigil of the seed of Abraham who had come along at a certain moment. And through Abraham's seed, all tribes and languages and peoples and nations would be blessed on earth. Then, when God founded the Jewish nation, the descendants of Abraham, he established laws by which his people were to live at the center of those laws was the pattern of redemption, of the forgiveness of sins by the payment of a blood sacrifice.

But the sacrificial system, the animal sacrificial system, could never truly cleanse sinners. It could not cleanse the guilty conscience, it was just a symbol, created an expectation of a perfect and final atoning sacrifice. And so all believers that understood this waited in a vigil for the final sacrifice to come. Then in the course of time, God raised up a king, a godly man, a righteous man after his own heart, David. King David. And at one point David wanted to build a house for the Lord, a temple for the Lord, a house for the Lord. But God said, "I'm going to build a house for you, and I'm going to raise up a son from your own body, and he will rule forever and ever the son of David who would reign on David's throne from that time on and forevermore," as you heard in Isaiah 9. This was the Anointed One, the Messiah, the Christ.

And so all believers that heard that specific promise began a vigil for the Messiah, the Christ. Well, centuries passed and when the time had almost fully come, the Spirit chose a godly man, Simeon, who we meet in our text tonight, a devout and God-fearing man. And he worked in him by faith in the ordinary way, an eagerness for the consolation of Israel to come, waiting for the consolation of Israel. This is just code language for the Messiah. He was waiting for the Messiah, as all believing Jews were. But the Spirit also had a special revelation for this one man, Simeon. One day, we don't know when, we don't know how long before the account we're reading tonight, he revealed to Simeon that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

Now that's a very special revelation. That's a unique promise. Now that was true, of course, of everyone that was there that day when Joseph and Mary and Jesus showed up, but only Simeon had been promised ahead of time that specific promise that he would not die before seeing the Lord's Christ. To him alone. And so Simeon began, from that moment, whenever it was, a unique vigil, watching for that moment when he would see the Lord's Christ with more eagerness, more specificity than any of his fellow Jews, his heart glowing with the specific promise that the Lord had made to him.

Now, our text tonight reveals that special moment that the promise was fulfilled. I don't imagine, I don't know if Simeon knew exactly the moment that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, maybe, maybe not, we don't know. Simeon, however, did not make the pilgrimage down to the nearby town of Bethlehem. He was right there in Jerusalem. So it seems he did not know the exact moment that Mary gave birth to her firstborn and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. But Joseph and Mary were law abiding Jews. And there are two powerful ways that God leads his people in this world. One is by obedience to the Scripture, by the written word of God, and the other is by those secret inner promptings of the Spirit. The two never contradict each other, but they work together in the text tonight.

Joseph and Mary were there because they were obeying the laws of Moses. Simeon was there because he was obeying the inner prompting of the Holy Spirit of God, and the two came together. Look at verses 21-24, Luke 2, “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived. When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, ‘Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord’), and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: ‘a pair of doves or two young pigeons.’”

So this was the beginning of Jesus's life under the Law. You heard read just a few moments ago, Galatians 4:4-5, “When the time had fully come, God sent His son, born of a woman, born under the Law, to redeem those who are under the Law.” So Jesus was, at the beginning of his life, on the eighth day, circumcised into the covenant of Moses, and he would live his whole life under the Law, under the Laws of Moses. He was the only perfect law-abiding Jewish person in all of history. At that moment, the moment that Joseph and Mary came to finish those regulations that were stipulated by the Law of Moses, and it says four times in this account, it refers to the Law or the Law of Moses, very clear that's why they were there.

At that moment, Simeon made his appearance. Look at verses 25- 28. “Now, there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Christ. Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. And when the parents had brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God.” So as I said, obedience to the Word of God led Joseph and Mary to the temple. Obedience to the inner prompting of the Holy Spirit led Simeon to the temple. And what a day for Simeon.

First, it had been revealed to him that he would not die before the Lord's Christ. Now, it seems, it had been further revealed to him that he would not go to bed tonight before seeing the Lord's Christ. Now what a day that was. Moved by the Spirit, he went to have the promise fulfilled. And so they come together, these godly people, three godly people around this miracle baby Jesus, the Savior of the world. Simeon's vigil had now come to a delightful and fulfilling end. He reached out and he took this little baby in his arms.

Now, if you had been there at that moment, all you would've seen is an old man, a young couple, a baby, nothing spectacular. There wouldn't be streams of glory, I don't think, coming down from Heaven. God could do that, but it wasn't the norm. There was no beauty or majesty in Jesus' appearance, nothing in his appearance. You would've just seen a very ordinary scene. That's all it looked like physically. But Simeon saw this baby with eyes of faith. Only by faith can we look beyond the ordinary appearance of Jesus and see what is really there, the glorious salvation that God intends for the whole world. So it is for all of you tonight, you will only see, in Jesus the Savior of the world, indeed your own Savior, if the Holy Spirit reveals Jesus to the eyes of your heart. And what are the eyes of your heart, but your faith, only if he reveals Jesus to you by faith, will you see him properly. Then Simeon spoke amazing words of prophecy over Jesus. Look at verses 28-32, “Simeon took him in his arms and praised God saying, ‘Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have promised and prepared in the sight of all people: a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.’"

So first he celebrated God's specific faithfulness to him personally. Lord, as you have promised to me, I waited in vigil all of this latter portion of my life, and now you have been faithful and you have fulfilled your promise to me. And then he says, "Now, dismiss your servant in peace." It's like this, my life purpose has been fulfilled. I'm ready to go. I have nothing else I need to do. You can dismiss your servant in peace because I have held this baby in my arms. But more significantly, Simeon saw beyond this simple moment and spoke these words, "My eyes have seen your salvation, the work of the Holy God in freeing his people from the ravages of sin and death, salvation from, sin and from all that sin has done to us and to the world." This is the salvation which God had been preparing for the world from before the foundation of the world.

As God promised to Abraham, this salvation would be for the blessing of all peoples on earth. And as Simeon said, "Worked in the sight of the entire world." Simeon then alluded to Isaiah 49:6, and there God the Father, spoke to the pre-incarnate Christ giving him his mission, saying, "It is too small a thing for you to be my servant, to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel that I have kept. I will also make you a light for the Gentiles that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth." That's the phrase that he uses, the light of revelation for the Gentiles. So this baby, it was said of him by God the Father through the prophet Isaiah, "It's too small a thing for you to only save the Jews. I will make you a light of salvation to the ends of the earth."

And he calls him a light of revelation for the Gentiles, a light of revelation. In other words, by the revealing of the same baby, this same Savior, to the Gentiles would salvation come. And they would be rescued out of darkness and brought into the beautiful light of Christ. Now, what is that darkness? Well, Isaiah 9:2 speaks of it, we heard it earlier, “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death, a light has dawn.” Ephesians 4 makes it plain that there's a mental, spiritual heart darkness that comes over all of us through sin, through the wickedness of our sins, through the disobedience that we have all done, breaking God's laws, darkness comes over our minds and over our hearts.

That's what it means, the people walking in darkness. And Jesus is the light of the world. And so he is a light of revelation. And when the Holy Spirit reveals Christ to your heart, you see the darkness you've been living in and you cross over from death to life. You move over from darkness to light. That's what Simeon meant. Now, can you imagine being Joseph and Mary and hearing these words? Jesus has the power to astonish. He has the power to make you amazed. And the first people to be amazed at Jesus were his parents. So imagine what it would've been like to be Joseph and Mary and hear these words. Verse 33, “The child's father and mother marvel that what was said about him.” But then the Holy Spirit moved Simeon to say some more and to speak some very specific prophecies about the cost of our salvation, the cost specifically to Mary, but then beyond her to understand what it takes, what it will take for us to be saved from our sins. Look at verses 34-35, then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother, "This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."

This is a clear prediction of the suffering that Mary would go through when she would see her perfect son first rejected by their own fellow citizens there in Nazareth, and then subsequently rejected by the Jewish Nation officially and then condemned to death by the Jewish leaders and condemned to death by the Gentiles and then crucified. She would stand there at the foot of the cross and watch her son die. She would hear him say, "Woman, behold your son." She would experience this piercing of her soul. And it says, "A sword will pierce your own soul too." In addition to what? In addition to the piercing that Christ would experience, because it says in Isaiah 53[:5], “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace was upon him and by his wounds we are healed.”

And it says, this child is destined for all of this. This is the plan laid out, set by the great architect of our salvation before the foundation of the world. He's destined for this. And he's destined, it says, to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel. Falling, because he is the judge of all the earth. And the ultimate falling would be to hear from his lips the righteous sentence that sinners deserve, who have never found salvation through faith in Christ, [Matthew 25:41] "Depart from me, you who are cursed into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels."

He has the power, the authority, and the right to speak those words because he is judge of all the earth and he is destined to cause the falling of many, not just in Israel, but even to the ends of the earth. But it also says rising. This is the same Greek word used for resurrection. He's destined to call the rising of many, not just in Israel, but even to the ends of the earth. So this is a special moment for Simeon when he takes this baby into his arms.

Now, I'm at an age right now where I get to do that with my grandchildren. I get to pick them up. I don't think it's going to last much longer. I know it's not. I've had kids of my own. Someone once said, "This has got to be one of the most depressing things I've heard in the last five years." There is a time when you put your kids down and never pick them up again. Isn't that depressing? But it's true. If I tried to pick up my firstborn son right now, I would probably wrench out my back permanently. I don't think it would be possible. But imagine the concept of Simeon, at one point, picking Jesus up and taking him in his arms and speaking these words over him. But then conversely, Simeon, dead in his tomb, hearing the voice of the Son of God and having the Son of God raise him up out of his grave. That's the ultimate destiny of this little baby. That's what we're celebrating. We're celebrating a victory of Christ, this baby born, this special baby that was spoken, these prophecies spoken about him destined to call to cause the rising of any who believe in him.

So, dear friends, here at First Baptist Durham for your Christmas Eve service, if you're a believer in Christ, you now have your own vigil. You're looking ahead to the future. You're looking ahead to your own growth and grace and the knowledge of Christ. Putting sin to death by the Spirit, growing in godliness, serving God in your own generation. And then if the Lord doesn't return in your lifetime dying and then rising at the right time or if you're part of the final generation, seeing him in the clouds. And so we are waiting for the sun from heaven it says in 1 Thessalonians 1:10. And the Lord's Supper that we're about to celebrate here is part of that vigil. It says amazingly in the words of institution, 1 Corinthians 11:26, “Whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.” So as we partake in this Lord's Supper, we are looking ahead to the second coming of Christ. It's part of our vigil by faith. We're looking forward to a banquet in which we'll sit a table with the King.

Now, Christmas Eve at First Baptist Church, we do something different with the Lord's Supper. Those of you that are ordinarily here for the Lord's Supper, ordinarily we pass out the bread and the juice as you're sitting right there in your pews. But tonight we're going to invite people, all of you to come forward and we're going to ask only those that have trusted in Christ as their personal Lord and Savior and testified to that by water baptism to actually partake. But you can come and stand with your family if you'd like, and come and stand around the table and we'll go in groups, and groups of maybe seven to 10, whatever, until the table's a little bit full, and then you partake and then you sit back down and then the next group comes and we'll just keep going until everyone's had the chance to come forward.

So I'm going to close this time in the word in prayer, and then I'm going to lead us into the words of institution with the Lord's Supper. And then you're going to come as the Lord leads. Father, thank you for the time we've had tonight in Luke chapter two, to meditate very briefly on Simeon and the amazing revelation that you worked in him. We thank you now for the opportunity that we have to celebrate the Lord's Supper. We pray that you would be in the midst of this celebration, that it would be joyful, that it would be part of our vigil, looking forward to the second coming of Christ and to the heavenly feast that will be beyond that. So bless us now with the presence of the Lord through the Spirit in this time, in the Lord's Supper. In Jesus name, amen. Here now.

Christmas Eve devotional on the faithful vigil of Simeon anticipating the coming of the Messiah and his encounter with baby Jesus in the temple.

The post Simeon’s Vigil and Ours appeared first on Two Journeys.

In this episode, we see God's sovereign providential control over events that could have endangered Paul's life.

The post Acts Podcast 44: A Plot Thwarted by God’s Providence appeared first on Two Journeys.

The amazing deliverances and miracles worked by God registered in Scripture are reminders against faithless forgetfulness.

Turn in your Bibles to Mark 8,  the passage that we're going to walk through it today. This morning, we have a layered story, I think, of forgetfulness. That's the unifying theme, of individuals that in some different ways forgot the mighty works and wonders of God and of Christ, and each of them will be instructive for us. Here are two different cases of forgetfulness. Right away in verse 14, we have the disciples having forgotten to bring bread, so we have the issue of their forgetfulness except for one loaf they had with them in the boat. This is a big deal. After all, Jesus and His disciples are moving around from place to place. They are always moving often in remote places where there was no one, there was no place for them to find provision,  so it must have been someone's job to get the bread, and they blew it. They didn't bring the bread. We'll talk about that, there's that forgetfulness.

But we also have this sinful forgetfulness before that of the Pharisees. Look at verses 11-13, "The Pharisees came and began to question Jesus. To test Him, they asked for a sign from heaven. He sighed deeply and said, 'Why does this generation ask for miraculous sign? I tell you the truth, no sign will be given to it.' Then he left them and got back into the boat and crossed to the other side." This constant demand for new signs, not the desire for the signs they had already had. It was as if the signs Jesus had done up to that moment meant nothing. Jesus' enemies dismissed all the prior evidence of His wonder working power, and they stood there again demanding a new sign from Him.

This is unfolded in detail in John 6, the day after the feeding of the 5,000. Now, this account is after the feeding of 4,000. But then in John 6, after the feeding the 5,000 earlier [ John 6:28-30,] the crowd came the next day, as we've mentioned, looking for breakfast, looking for another meal, and Jesus challenges them. “Then they asked Him, ‘What must we do to work the works of God?’ Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the one He has sent.’ So they asked Him, ‘What miraculous sign, then, will You give it that we may see it and believe You? What will you do? Our forefathers ate the man in the desert, as it is written. He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”

That's stunning. The very next day after the feeding of the 5,000, they're asking for another sign, "What sign will You do?" It seems that they wanted a continual river of signs, day after day after day, like Moses did, the manna down day after day, miracles every day, and they sinfully forgot the works of Christ as if they were instantly forgettable. We have stories of forgetfulness, that's what I want to draw out today.

In order for this, we need to understand the indispensable role of Jesus' miracles, of the signs and wonders that Jesus did. The miracles are the fundamental proof of the deity of Christ. They were then, they are now. For example, in John 4, a royal official whose son lay dying came and asked Jesus to heal him. Jesus said in John 4:48, "Unless you people see signs and wonders, you'll never believe." In John 5, the next chapter, Jesus gave layers of testimonies of proof of His personhood, of His deity. He talked about the ministry of John the Baptist and his testimony of Jesus, and then He spoke of His works, His miracles. John 5:36, “'I have testimony,’" Jesus said, “'weightier than that of John. For the very work the Father has given Me to do, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me.'"

Later in John's Gospel to His own disciples, He openly says that the miracles are valid basis of faith in Him. John 14:11, "Believe Me when I say that the Father is in Me and I am in the Father. Or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves." John 14:11, valid basis of faith. Without the miracles, we would have no reason to believe in Jesus. The primary, the central miracle of Jesus' whole ministry is His bodily resurrection from the dead. Romans 10:9 says, "If you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." And so, we have to believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus from the grave in order to be saved.

In John 20, doubting Thomas represents the unbelieving world, needing evidence. Jesus had come the week before and given physical evidence of His bodily resurrection from the dead, but Thomas hadn't been there. "Thomas was not with them," it says in John 20:24, "when the disciples came. So the other disciples told him, 'We have seen the Lord.' But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the nail marks in His hands and put my finger where the nails were and put my hand in the side, I will not believe it.’"

A week later, as disciples were in the house again and Thomas was with them, though the doors were locked, “Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then He said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here. See my hands. Reach out your hand, put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.’ Thomas said to Him, ‘My Lord and my God.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Because you have seen me you have believed. Blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed.’"

On what basis are we going to not see and yet believe that Jesus is God, that He rose from the dead? On the basis of this alone: scripture's testimony to the miracles of Jesus. On the basis of this alone will you be saved. You have to believe the miracles that are written in this book. Remember them and believe them. In the very next couple of verses it says, "Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not recorded in this book," [Gospel of John] "But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. And by believing, you may have life in His name. These are written that you may believe." That's the basis. You read it, believe that it's true, and you have life in His name. 

Similarly, we see in the Old Testament the same issue. The miracles that God did for Israel were the basis of their whole faith in Him, the signs and wonders. He showed Himself to them in Egypt and then in the desert, and He proved His wonder working power that would be the basis of their faith in Him. But they had a tragic history of forgetfulness. These Pharisees here in Mark 8 stand in the place of their ancestors, standing right there in the place of their ancestors with the same attitude of forgetful unbelief. We saw this during the exodus itself. Remember at the Red Sea, after the 10 plagues? Ten plagues, that's a lot of evidence, a lot of miracles.

Now the Israelites have made the exodus, and they're there at the Red Sea. They suddenly look up and see Pharaoh in his army ready to exterminate them, filled with rage, drawing near to slaughter them. They cry out in faithless forgetfulness, faithless forgetfulness of all of God's wonder working power. Exodus 14, "They said to Moses, 'Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us out here in the desert to die? What have you done to us bringing us out of Egypt? Didn't we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone. Let us serve the Egyptians.”'? It would've been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die here in the desert.'" Faithless forgetfulness of God's wonder working power. How could they forget so soon? So God dealt strongly with Moses and with Israel.

Exodus 14:15-17, "Then the Lord said to Moses, 'Why are you crying out to Me? Tell the Israelites to move on. Raise your staff, stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground. I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them.’” With that new miracle, the most spectacular of them all, with the water walling up to the right and to the left, God proved His power again. On the other side of the Red Sea, Israel celebrated and worshiped, but their habit of forgetting God's wonder working power is just getting going. They go out in the desert and need food, and they start complaining about the food. They need water, and they start complaining about the lack of water. So with no food, they cry out against God and against Moses as if nothing had happened up to that point.  Exodus 16, "The Israelites said to them, 'If only we had died by the Lord's hand in Egypt. There in the good old days, we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted.'" Just let me stop there. Do you remember the account that way? Is that how it was for them? I remember something about task masters and bitter life and all that. But anyway, I return. "'We just sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.' Then the Lord said to Moses, 'I will reign down bread from heaven for you.'"

Shortly thereafter, in the next chapter, there's no water. Exodus 17:3, "The people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, 'Why did you bring us out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?'" We're not going to starve to death, but we're going to die of a lack of water. That's what's going to get us. "The Lord answered Moses, 'Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile.'" What's that? A reminder of the previous miracles. "'Take that staff and go. I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.' So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. He called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord saying, 'Is the Lord among us or not?'"

Then again, on the brink of the promised land, after Sinai, after all of these wonders, after many meals, miraculous meals of manna, water from the rock, they come to the brink of the promised land. They send out twelve spies, they come back, and ten of them spoke terrible words of unbelief concerning God. They turned the hearts of the people away from God despite all that God had done for them up to that point. Moses pleaded with them, but God judged them. Moses rehearsed this whole thing in Deuteronomy 1. "Moses said, 'Then I said to you, 'Do not be terrified. Do not be afraid of them. The Lord your God who is going before you will fight for you as He did for you in Egypt before your very eyes. And in the desert, there you saw how the Lord your God carried you, as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place.'"

Remember how faithful God was to you. Remember the wonders He did on your behalf, but “in spite of this, you did not trust the Lord your God, who went ahead of you on your journey in fire by night and the cloud by day to search out places for you to camp and to show you the way you should go. When the Lord heard what you said, He was angry and solemnly swore, 'Not a man of this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give to your forefathers.'" Why? Because they forgot God's wonder working power on their behalf. He judged them, they would not be permitted to enter the promised land.

Eventually they did go in and conquer the promised land. The walls of Jericho fell, an amazing miracle. Then just incredible provision, all the military conquest, they took over most of the promised land. Amazing things. But then you get the Book of Judges. What a wretched book that is. In Judges 2 it says, "After that whole generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation grew up who neither knew the Lord nor what He had done for Israel." How did that happen? I'm going to tell you: bad parenting. They didn't know anything about it, never heard of it, never heard about the wonders God had done. They didn't know anything about it. No baby is born knowing the wonders of God. They have to be taught. They didn't teach them.

Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. Psalm 78 gives a summary of all this, the very kind of history I've been walking through with you, Psalm 78. It says this, "What we have heard and known, what our fathers have told us, we will not hide them from their children. We will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, His power and the wonders He has done. He decrees statutes for Jacob and established the law in Israel, which He commanded our forefathers to teach their children, so the next generation would know them." To know what? The wonders, the miracles God has done. The next generation would know the miracles, the wonders God has done. "And even the children yet to be born. And they in turn would tell their children. Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget His deeds but keep His commands."

A few verses later, "The men of Ephraim, though armed with bows, turned back on the day of battle. They did not keep God's covenant. They refused to live by His law. They forgot what He had done, the wonders He had shown them. He did miracles in the sight of the fathers in the land of Egypt, in the region of Zoan. He divided the sea and led them through. He made the water stand firm like a wall. He guided them with the cloud by day and with light of fire by night." The psalm is just recording that same dreadful history I just did, God's miracles for Israel and their wicked pattern of forgetting those miracles and sinning against God.

Psalm 78:32-33, is a kind of a summation, "In spite of all this, they kept on sinning. In spite of His wonders, they did not believe." In spite of His wonders, they did not believe. "So He ended their days in futility and their years in terror." The rest of the psalm just continues to recount the same tragic pattern: God's amazing power unleashed for Israel and then their sinful habit of forgetting that power soon afterward and lurching again into sinful idolatrous rebellion.

Now back to Mark 8, these Pharisees stand in a long tradition, in the place of their ancestors, of forgetting the mighty wonders of God which they had just seen done. Look at verse 11, "The Pharisees came and began to question Jesus. To test Him, they asked Him for a sign from heaven." Jesus judges the unbelievers' forgetfulness here. They're here to test Him. This was exactly the same motive, don't you remember, of Israel at Massah and Meribah: testing to see if God was real? Exodus 17:7, "He called that place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled because they tested the Lord saying, 'Listen, is the Lord among us or not?' So it is with these Pharisees, putting Jesus to the test, ‘Is the Lord among us or not? Is God with us?’"

Do you know what the word for “God with us" is? Emmanuel. Is God with us or not? He is. Jesus is Emmanuel. He is God with us. They're doing the same thing, testing, saying, "Is God with us or not?" They've already made up their minds that He's not. They've made up their minds that Jesus did his miracles by the power of Beelzebub. Remember that? That's earlier in Mark's gospel. They've already made up their minds, so Jesus sighs. It's a sigh of judgment and exasperation. They have tested the patience of God. "He sighed deeply and said, 'Why does this generation ask for a miraculous sign? I tell you the truth, no sign will be given to it.' Then He left them, got back into the boat, and crossed to the other side." Judgment. No more signs.

The sigh here is radically different than the sigh at the end of Mark 7, which He used to heal the deaf mute man. Remember how He gently put His fingers in the man's ears and spit and touched his tongue and then sighed deeply? That was a sigh of healing like the breath of air, the breath of the Spirit moving. This, though, is a sigh of exasperation and of sorrow over their unbelief. He takes no pleasure in the death of His enemies. If their wicked, testing, unbelieving hearts are not converted, those unbelieving hearts will lead them to hell. He knows that better than they do, better than anyone does, and so He sighed, but He also refuses to give them any sign at all.

Actually, in Matthew's Gospel He does say, "Except." There's additional information. It's always interesting as you compare the accounts, Matthew and Mark. Whenever there's additional information, you know it's true. Mark for his own wise purposes under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit truncated the answer, “No sign will be given.” Period. But Matthew said a little more, Matthew 12:38-41, "Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Him, 'Teacher, we want to see a miraculous sign from You.' He answered, 'A wicked and adulterous generation asked for a miraculous sign, but none will be given it except the sign of the Prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah. And now, one, someone greater than Jonah is here.'"

What is the sign of Jonah? It's a resurrection. On the third day, He would come out of the grave, but they wouldn't see Him. What they would get is the same thing the men of Nineveh got: preaching. They get preaching. They get representatives of the resurrected Lord who would stand in downtown Jerusalem and proclaim that Christ has risen. That's the sign they're going to get. They'll believe or they won't based on the preaching.  But we know, the great tragedy is this, even this, the greatest sign there has ever been in history, the empty tomb, still wasn't enough. They still didn't believe.  

Now let's talk about Jesus's disciples, that forgetful bunch. You're like, "Are they forgetting too?" They are, but Jesus decides to heal them from their forgetfulness, not to judge them. Aren't you glad? It's like, "Well, actually, pastor, I don't need that, I don't forget God's mighty wonders and His works in my life." Yes, you do. We all do. But isn't it wonderful how patient Christ is with us and how He is willing to train us and to deal with us. He heals us as He healed the believers.

Look at verses 14-21, "The disciples had forgotten to bring bread except for one loaf they had with them in the boat. 'Be careful,' Jesus warned them, 'watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.' They discussed it with one another and said, 'It's because we have no bread.' Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them, 'Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? You have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear. Don't you remember?'" I circled that in my manuscript. Do you see that? Don't you remember? "'When I broke the five loaves with the 5,000, how many baskets full of pieces did you pick up?' 'Twelve,' they replied. 'And when I broke the seven loads of the 4,000, how many baskets full of pieces did you pick up?' They answered, 'Seven.' He said to them, 'Do you still not understand?'"

First, let's talk about the smaller issue, they forgot to bring bread. Whose job was that? I mean I think they must have been on a rotating schedule kind of thing. "It was your turn." "No, I had last week." "No, it was your turn." They're going back and forth. It's interesting how Jesus didn't know what they're arguing about. They're doing it off to the side, they don't want Jesus to know about this discussion. I know it says discussion, we don't know they're arguing, but come on, what do you think? So they're going back and forth, they're talking about forgetting to bring bread.

Now, I want to stop and apply this. Isn't it wonderful that God has our back even when we are stupid and forget things that we should take care of? I mean this is a takeaway. You're going to make mistakes in life. You're going to forget. You're going to mess up. God has your back, don't sweat it. I'm not saying be irresponsible. I'm not saying go to the airport and forget your passport. What I am saying is God has your back, He'll take care of you, because we do forget.

The topic here Jesus wants them to focus on is some special instruction and teaching and training He's doing for the apostolic ministry. He wanted to warn them about the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod. They're thinking bread. He's not talking bread, He's using an analogy. In case we don't really know what He's talking about, Matthew elucidates, makes it very plain. Matthew 16:12, "Then they understood that He was not telling them to guard against the yeast used in bread, but against the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees." Mark mentions Herod. I think all three were discussed. You always combine them. He's warning about the yeast, the teaching of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Herod, or Herodians.

 Yeast is bad teaching. Why is it called yeast? Because it spreads through the whole lump. It permeates. It poisons. Paul uses a disease analogy about bad teaching spreading like gangrene, but it's the same idea.  In the passage on church discipline, 1 Corinthian 5, he talks about getting rid of a sexually immoral member of their church and says, "A little yeast leavens the whole lump." If you don't get rid of that person, the sin's going to spread. You got to get rid of it. So that's the yeast analogy here. What is He specifically warning about? The teaching of the Pharisees and the Sadducees and Herod. What is it? We don't have anything elucidated here, but we know from other places. The Pharisees were self-righteous legalists who were whitewashed tombs. They look good on the outside, but inside they're corrupt. They thought by their law-keeping they were good enough for heaven, and they weren't. They were merciless toward others. They tied up heavy loads and crushed people with them, but didn't lift a finger to help them.Matthew 23 goes through the sins of the Pharisees and what they're like. We also find out that they had a taste for widows' homes. They were worldly and wealthy and wicked Pharisees. 

Then the Sadducees, these are the ones that deny that there is a resurrection of the dead. “Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die and there's nothing beyond the grave.” That's the Sadducees, that's a bad way to live. This world is all there is, that was the Sadducees. They also denied that there is a spirit world with angels and demons. They denied the teaching of the Word. They were ignorant because they don't know the scriptures are the power of God.  Then the Herodians. Herod was a wicked, worldly, pleasure-loving, birthday-feast-celebrating guy who collaborated with the Romans and did whatever he needed to do to keep power. He saw his brother's wife, wanted her, and she divorced her husband and married him and all that. John the Baptist warned him plainly, and he killed him. That's Herod. The Herodians were those kinds of people who celebrated Herod's power. That's what they taught.

 Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Herod. The disciples didn't understand that. They thought He was talking about literal bread. They should have been [Matthew 6] seeking first His kingdom and His righteousness and letting God take care of their empty stomachs.  It's not about what you're going to chew and swallow today. We've got a higher calling here than feeding your bellies. He has to address their hardened hearts again. You remember back in Mark 6 when Jesus walked on water and then the storm instantly stopped when He got in the boat? Do you remember the editorial comment that Mark gave? Mark 6:51-52,"They were completely amazed for they had not understood about the loaves. Their hearts were hard."

The lesson of the loaves is that Jesus can do anything, that they shouldn't live for physical bread, that Jesus is God. The lesson of the loaves is belief in Jesus and then seeking first His kingdom and His righteousness, not worrying about earthly things. The lesson of the loaves, who Jesus is, how they should live, that's the lesson of the loaves. They didn't understand. Now with the second feeding, they still don't understand the lesson of the loaves, so He has to address their hardened hearts. Jesus can care for their physical needs, and they should trust Him for it.  Listen again to Jesus's rebuke, verse 17-21, "'Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? You have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear. Don't you remember, when I broke the five loads to the 5,000, how many baskets full of pieces did you pick up?' 'Twelve,' they applied. 'And when I broke the seven loaves to the 4,000, how many baskets full of pieces did you pick up?' They answered, 'Seven.' He said to them, 'Do you still not understand?'"

In Matthew’s Gospel, He's very clear, He's zeroing in on their unbelief. He's zeroing in on they're having little faith. Not no faith, they believe, but their faith isn't strong enough like it should be. This is a very important theological principle, I want to give this to you, something that I hadn't known for many years but God showed it to me in this direct account. That is, yes, faith comes by hearing the Word [Romans 10:17]. Faith comes by hearing the Word, but faith also comes by experience. By living through certain things, you should learn some lessons that will stand you in good stead for the future. Isn't that the basic principle here? You remember what we walked through, you remember that? You should know the lesson. Then we lived through that. You remember we walked through that? You were there, your own hands picked up the baskets. Did you learn nothing?

Faith comes from a combination of the ministry of the Word and life in God's world. They go together. There's this beautiful system, this symbiotic relationship between ongoing teaching of the Word and the lessons you learn in life. Together they get you ready for the next challenges. The idea is, the next time you're hungry, don't faithlessly think you're going to starve to death, trust God to meet your needs. The next time you have a financial crisis, remember how faithful God was the last time. The next time you have a medical crisis, receive the faithfulness of God all of the ways He has dealt with you. Faith comes by experience as well as by the ministry of the Word. They go together. That's a fundamental concept here.

Paul says he said he learned the secret of Christian contentment, Philippians 4. He said, "I've learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I've learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well-fed or hungry, living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through Him who strengthens me." How did he learn the secret of Christian contentment? By living through it and seeing God's faithfulness.

Also, maturity comes by suffering. You have to live through suffering to become mature. Paul talks about it in 2 Corinthians 1:8-10, "We do not want you to be unformed brothers about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death, but this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God who raises the dead." Do you hear that? We went through this suffering to strip us of self-reliance.

Self-reliance is the number one idol that God wants to kill in saving us through faith in Christ, that you would not think you can save yourself, that your righteousness is enough, you can do these things by yourself. "We," Paul says, "had to go through this immense trial in Asia to teach us to not rely on ourselves but on God who raises the dead." Why do you think he adds that extra phrase, "God who raises the dead."? Because that's the finish line of your salvation, when you have been raised from the dead, you'll be done being saved. What's coming in the future, that's the big test. Your death, your burial, and then what? Let me just ask you, you self-reliant folks, what are your plans for raising yourself from the grave? What's your strategy? That's a big one. What are you going to do to raise yourself from the grave? You can do nothing. Therefore, learn to trust the God who raises the dead.  For lesser things, be stripped of self-reliance and learn to rely on God. That's the lesson of life, the lesson of suffering. 

Are there some other lessons to learn? Yes, there are. What about our forgetfulness? Do you have any forgetfulness? I just said that we all do. How are we living out a faithless forgetfulness of God's amazing works in the past? Ask God to show you, "How am I forgetting your kindness to me, God?" How do our anxieties and fears with new trials show that we haven't learned the lesson of the loaves yet? We still need to trust Him. How does our murmuring and complaining against God when we're in trial show that our hearts are hard like the Israelites at Massah and Meribah? How are we murmuring against God? Just ask God to show you.

Secondly, be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Go back over the scriptures regularly, read about the miracles. These miracles are for us. The beauty is, even though God won't necessarily do the same miracles in your life that He did then, He's the same God now that He was then. He's the same yesterday, today, and forever, so trust in Him. Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Go through the Word of God and remember, study the miracles of Israel. Study the 10 plagues. Study the Red Sea crossing. Study the manna and the water flowing through the rock and say, "God is able to provide for me." But even more, I would say, even better, study the miracles of Jesus. I just love walking through this, the effortless healings, effortless, and creative healings, and the fact that He's going to do that to our dead bodies, instantly fixing every system of your body so that it will never experience death, mourning, crying, or pain again. He will do that, that’s the power of Jesus.

Thirdly, I'm advocating good parenting. Teach your children the mighty works of God so that they will not be faithless and forget about God. Psalm 78, "What we have heard and known, what our fathers have told us, we will not hide them from our children. We will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, His power, and the wonders He has done. He decreed statutes for Jacob and established the law in Israel, which He commanded our forefathers to teach their children, so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children. Then, they would put their trust in God and would not forget His deeds but would keep His commands. They would not be like their forefathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation whose hearts were not loyal to God and whose spirits were not faithful to Him."

So look at the lessons we Christian parents should be teaching to our children daily. The praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, His power, the wonders He has done. Start with creation. Start with the astonishing universe God created by the word of His power. By the breath of His mouth were the heavens made. Then teach them the history of God's wise dealings with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and with the Jewish nation in all of their history. Walk your children through the history of God's workings with Israel. Keep going and show them Israel's sins, but also their righteous acts and their times of trusting in God. Especially, saturate your kids in the life of Jesus, in His amazing miracles, all of the things that He did. Let them know the miracles from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Don't spare them, but pour them out on your children and teach them so that they would know how great Christ is, the magnitude of His person, the greatness of His work, especially His bloody death on the cross and His mighty resurrection victory. Saturate your kids in the greatness of God. The reason Psalm 78 gives for this parent-child instruction is, "So that they will put their trust in God, would not forget His deeds, and show their faith by their obedience to His commands." That's just good parenting. Let's do it.

Finally, my lost friends who came here this morning, who walked in here this morning not yet saved, not yet forgiven, do you realize all of the miracles of Jesus that are written in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are written for sinners like you and me, so that we would find forgiveness of our sins? I'm pleading with you, look to Christ, trust in Him. All you need to do is repent of your sins and call on the name of the Lord. Believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, and you will be saved.

 Close with me in prayer. Father, thank You for the lessons that we've had from this sad story of forgetfulness, the unbelieving and wicked forgetfulness of the Pharisees who tested Jesus asking for a sign, but then the weakness of the faith and the weak forgetfulness of the disciples who needed to be strengthened and who needed to understand the lessons and to take them to heart so that their faith would develop. O God, work with us, heal us. Help us to not be without understanding, but that we would see the significance of these gospel accounts and trust in Jesus for the salvation of our souls. In Jesus' name. Amen.

The amazing deliverances and miracles worked by God registered in Scripture are reminders against faithless forgetfulness.

The post Forgetting God’s Wonders (Mark Sermon 36) appeared first on Two Journeys.

God gave us our faith, to begin with, and only God through Christ can keep it alive.

The post Faith and Character: Class 3 appeared first on Two Journeys.

The doctrine of justification by faith, apart from works of the law, does not mean we can sin as much as we want without worries.

The post Class in Romans: Dead to Sin, Alive to God in Christ Jesus appeared first on Two Journeys.

A spiritually mature person knows the Bible very well, has a wealth of personal experiences in God’s world, and their faith enables the soul to rest securely in God.

The post Knowledge and Faith: Class 2 appeared first on Two Journeys.

Jesus shows His kindness and compassion by repeating the miracle of feeding a multitude as a reminder that He knows our needs.

The post Jesus Feeds a Multitude… Again! (Mark Sermon 35) appeared first on Two Journeys.