Title: Binding the Strong Man

Text: Matthew 12:29

Date: October 25th, 2009

When Jesus came two thousand years ago to begin his work of salvation on earth for us, he didn’t come into a friendly or even neutral world. He came into a hostile environment, because Satan or “the god of this world” as the Bible describes him (John 12:31, 14:30,  2 Corinthians 4:4), had already laid claim to the planet earth and all its occupants. So Jesus was really invading enemy territory when he arrived in his incarnate, human form. But if this is so, how could Jesus go about his work of converting and leading people out of “darkness into his marvelous light” — as another biblical passage describes (1 Peter 2:9)? The answer is Jesus had to first deal with the Devil, defeat him, and then and only then could he free the spiritual captives from sin, death and damnation. That’s exactly what Matthew 12:29 is describing, “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can rob his house.” I like how the King James Version puts it – “binds the strong man,” because it conveys the sense of seriousness involved in subduing Satan or Lucifer, that is, actually “binding” him fast so that he can’t actively have his way in the life of an individual. The ancient world was a very dark place – not that today’s secular, modern world isn’t a very dark place also – but ancient times were particularly dark because at that time there was no Christian truth and light present in society, or any Christian church heritage to refer to. We take it for granted that for 2000 years biblical Christian values have shaped Western civilization and American culture. We are seeing the rapid erosion of those biblical Christian values in our culture today, particularly in America with abortion and homosexual rights gaining power, but it’s nothing like it was in ancient times. At least today there is the memory of the Bible, of the church, of the Christian faith standards for right and wrong, of true and false. But in ancient times, in most nations, there was gross immorality and deep darkness; there was dark spiritual error as the normal state of affairs. The Devil and his demons had a field day, so to speak, in the world at that time. The Jewish nation was somewhat of an exception to the norm as far as spiritual truth and good, because God had taught it through the prophets of the Old Testament, but it too was operating in a state of spiritual darkness by the time Jesus arrived on the scene. Its religion had degenerated into a state of rule-keeping and very little spiritual insight and power. So when Jesus began his ministry in the land of Israel, he found the Devil and demons everywhere opposing him, both directly in one-on-one encounters and indirectly through evil opposition in the person of the Pharisees, Sadducees, Jewish scribes, and other leaders. So one of the first priorities of Jesus was to deal with or neutralize the threat of organized evil. He had to constantly “bind the strong man” in order to free the captive souls of humanity. That’s what I’d like to talk about today. What use do we have for this kind of teaching? It’s a reminder that there should be a priority to our struggle to do God’s will in our lives – we should deal with any spiritual opposition we find first before we try to carry out the will of God. This only makes sense. Let me explain.

First, the earth is presently Satan’s domain and he rules it. Matthew 12:29, “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions?” Notice the metaphor describes an owner of a house with possessions; this is describing Satan’s claim to ownership of the earth, and to people as his possessions. It’s a chilling description because it actually uses the word “possession” which is exactly what happens when Satan takes full control of a persons mind, body and soul. In Genesis we see the Devil in the Garden of Eden before the Fall of Man tempting Adam and Eve to disobey God and sin by eating the forbidden fruit. He eventually gets them to sin through deception and they lose their spiritual innocence; they become fallen creatures as the earth and everything in it is cursed by God as a result. Ever since that time Satan has laid claim to the world through the first original sin; he assumes he is entitled to it through Adam and Eve’s decision to follow him, not God. He has taken on this authority as fallen humanity has followed him into sin and rebellion ever since. Now not all of humanity is in the same degree of spiritual darkness as other parts of humanity; there are better people groups and there are worse people groups as far as spiritual knowledge and practice. For example, there are different ethnic groups that are more bound in certain sins of immorality than others. There are still other ethnic groups that have been influenced by the Bible and Christianity that conduct themselves in a more excellent moral manner – for example, the early Americans such as the Pilgrims and Puritans used to be known for there faith and piety. But today, even these territories inhabited by especially moral people have fallen into gross immorality. For example, the state of Massachusetts, once the home of moral Pilgrims and Puritans, now is one of the leading areas in the nation for abortion and homosexual rights. The State of Massachusetts just passed legislation allowing for so-called gay marriage. So just because a people and a place were once famous for truth and light doesn’t mean that people and place will remain in the truth and light. There are plenty of other examples to show that the light can be retaken by darkness if people allow it. But when Jesus came to earth 2000 years ago there was great darkness. Remember the prophecy that Jesus quotes at the beginning of his ministry, “Land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, the way to the sea, along the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles – the people living in darkness have see a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned,” Matthew 4:15-16. Jesus couldn’t just start in teaching and leading people, he first had to deal with the Devil. It’s a good reminder to us all that we don’t live in neutral territory either. The Devil is here along with his demons; evil is in the world. We shouldn’t be surprised that our efforts to do the will of God are opposed. We can’t ignore the presence of evil, as much as we’d like to. Unfortunately, most people, most Christians even, ignore the Devil, demons and evil. It isn’t a pleasant thought. They live as if the world were spiritually neutral. They live as if the only problems are those generated by nature and people, but that isn’t true. Not all of our problems originate in material causes; some are generated by spiritual evil in opposition to us. We need to realize that in order to deal with it.

Second, Satan’s dominion must be broken. Matthew 12:29, “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man?” The strategy Satan uses today more than he did in times past is to get people to deny his very existence. What better way to work secretly than to make people think you don’t exist? How easy it would have been during the time of the Revolutionary War in American, for example, if the British had successfully convinced the Americans that they weren’t sending troops to fight in the first place, or that even after they had said troops, that they really hadn’t been sent to fight? If the people had believed that they wouldn’t have prepared for battle and would have been defeated rather easily. Well, it’s the same way with us today. Most people don’t believe there really is a Devil or that there really are demons. Consequently, they don’t prepare to deal with them and as a result fall victim to them. Look at the violence in our society, as just one example, and ask the simple question, “Can all of this violence be explained simply as the result of human actions?” It’s pretty hard to explain the kinds of violence we see today on just the human level. The shootings in Columbine, Colorado – by the way, I was living in Colorado at the time during the late 90s, and I can say it was shocking to everyone there as it was for our whole nation – consider that evil. What “possessed” those young men to shoot their own classmates and then kill themselves? Disgruntled students, anger, rage – these are all common conditions among young people at different times, but they usually result in maybe bad behavior, maybe fighting or some kind of petty crime, but mass murder? No, that’s something far beyond the normal. I think the only adequate explanation for their violent actions is demonic evil. We live in an increasingly dark world, but it was also dark in ancient times, which is why Jesus had to deal with demons in his life and ministry, just as we need to deal with the Devil today. And we must deal with the Devil today. There is no escaping it. In the best of all possible worlds we wouldn’t have to even think of such things because they aren’t pleasant things to think about. It’s scary to think there are evil creatures out there, invisible, secretly operating against us, for our destruction. But it’s true. So in doing God’s will, in living out our daily lives, we are going to have to deal with spiritual evil. There’s no escaping that. So how do we do it? We do what Jesus did, in Jesus’ name – we bind the Devil, we neutralize him, we render him powerless. How do we do that? Primarily through prayer. We do what Michael the archangel did – as described in the tiny book of Jude, “But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not dare to bring a slanderous accusation against him, but said, ‘The Lord rebuke you!’” – Jude 9. So whenever we encounter a situation that seems evil or demonic, we pray seriously for the Lord to bind Satan or neutralize his effects. We call upon the Lord for help in dealing with the Devil.

Third, once Satan’s power is removed, God’s kingdom can become established. Matthew 12:29, “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can rob his house.” It’s interesting that the Lord Jesus adds that last phrase, “Then he can rob his house.” It’s as if he wants to remind us that if we don’t first deal with the Devil then of course we can’t take his possessions, or in other words, unless we neutralize the power of the demons, we can’t accomplish God’s will or advance his kingdom. The power of Satan, if unchecked, will simply be too much for us in our work. Our efforts will be futile unless we first deal with the problem of Satan and his demons. Why are a lot of Christians defeated in life? Why are Christians still caught in sin and darkness, even after they’ve professed faith in Christ, or even joined a church or been baptized? Because they don’t take the enemy seriously enough and they fall prey to his power to hold them captive still. When the Lord uses the phrase at the end of the verse, “Then he can rob his house,” he’s basically saying, only after we successfully deal with the Devil can we move on and carry out the will of God. Now that doesn’t mean that we all have to go around performing exorcisms – that is, actually casting demons out of people. That’s an extreme form of demonic opposition which most people, the vast majority of people, will never have to deal with, thankfully. But there are all kinds of lesser encounters with evil that we must be ready to handle. Yet, most Christians walk through life as if there were no enemy, no Devil and no demons to oppose them. Why is there so much depression, for example, today, even among Christians? Is it not evident that this is but one way that demons can operate in opposition to Christians today? I’m not saying that all depression is spiritually caused, or that depression generally is caused by demonic possession. I’m saying that it’s an easy way for demons to hinder Christians from doing the will of God in their lives – by causing them depression, by messing with our minds, by planting depressing thoughts in our head and causing us to reflect over and over on these depressing ideas. Our best counter to this attack of the enemy is to stand on the promises of God found in the Bible. “Greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world,” is a great biblical promise to stand on (1 John 4:4). We need to put on the armor of God, as Ephesians 6:10-18, “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints.” There’s a lot there and we don’t have the time to unpack it today, but we get the point. We must be prepared; we can’t simply ignore all this even if we wanted to.

I’m afraid when we look at the average Christian we see ignorance and powerlessness over the opposition of the enemy. I’m afraid the typical Christian falls prey to the Devil’s attacks almost every time. We live in an age where belief in the Devil is almost a joke. Most people don’t seriously consider that there are really evil personages attacking them from the spiritual realm. People today try to explain everything either physically or psychologically. Even Christians fall into the trap of trying to reduce every problem into a category so that some human technique can solve it. Most people subscribe to the philosophy of the late president John F. Kennedy who once said, “Man’s problems have been caused by man, and can be solved by man.” Now that sounds like a good approach to tackling the problems of the world, but it’s actually foolish. It naively assumes that all of the problems that we experience in life, individually and as a group, we cause ourselves and therefore can be solved by ourselves as well. But that ignores the whole spiritual world. It also ignores so much of the biblical truth of the Devil and demons in the world today. There are problems that we encounter in life that are not caused by anyone or anything on earth. We will face problems that are caused by spiritual evil, and our human, man-made solutions that normally work for us won’t help. We’ll need to be able to turn to prayer and God’s Word seriously in order to face a spiritual attack. Only through the power of God working in prayer and God’s Word will be able to successfully overcome the enemy’s opposition. I myself have a difficult time remembering that, just as the Bible says, “our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, and rulers in high places,” (Ephesians 6:12). I have a tendency, as we all do today living in the modern world, to think I can solve a problem through thinking my way through situation. I’ll try to come up with a plan, ranging from a simple plan to a complex plan, in order to solve the problem. But some problems can’t be solved through a rational plan. That’s the problem in much of Christianity today, especially in churches today – thinking that the Lord’s work can be carried out simply by making rational plans and carrying them out. For example, if the church needs to raise money to build a larger building what does it do? Well, today with the emphasis on business management techniques, the pastor and church leaders will hire a consultant, formulate a plan and carry out that plan. This works in areas where there isn’t anything particularly spiritual, but how does this rational planning work in spiritual matters? It usually fails. Why? Because our weapons of warfare – as the Bible says – are not carnal, but spiritual (2 Corinthians 10:4). We need to use the appropriate weapons against demonic opposition. If we don’t, we’ll fail. Are you trying to fight spiritual battles using material weapons? Are you trying to ignore the spiritual battle altogether? You can’t; it won’t go away. You must fight off the attacks of the enemy with all the spiritual resources of God. We don’t have to be defeated by the enemy, we can fight back, but we must do so spiritually, through prayer and the Word of God.

Title: The Absolute Absurdity of “Gay” Rights

Text: Isaiah 5:20

Date: October 15th, 2009

Less than a week ago, president Barack Obama spoke at a “gay” rights group dinner in Washington D.C. where in his official position as president promoted gay rights and gay marriage. He also criticized those who would oppose so-called “gay” rights. But what is most disturbing is that he went further than any president before him in affirming the homosexual lifestyle and in promoting gay marriage. For example, at one point in the speech he stated, “My expectation is that when you look back on these years, you will see a time in which we put a stop to discrimination against gays and lesbians – whether in the office or on the battlefield. You will see a time in which we as a nation finally recognize relationships between two men or two women as just as real and admirable as relationships between a man and a woman. You will see a nation that’s valuing and cherishing these families as we build a more perfect union – a union in which gay Americans are an important part. I am committed to these goals. And my administration will continue to achieve them.” Notice the sentence in particular — “You will see a time in which we as a nation finally recognize relationships between two men and two women as just as real and admirable as relationships between a man and a woman.” I emphasized the last part to bring out the radical step the president took. Never before has any president ever advocated that homosexual relationships be seen as the moral equivalent of traditional heterosexual relationships. Never has any president ever considered the homosexual relationship between two men or two women as legitimate, as moral, as right as the traditional heterosexual relationship of man and woman. This is nothing less than the complete normalization of homosexuality in society. The president says, “I am committed to these goals. And my administration will continue to achieve them.” He’s calling for nothing less than the total and complete normalization of homosexuality in the United States. Now what has the reaction been to this radical statement by the president? There’s basically been no wide-scale reaction because hardly anybody has heard or seen the president’s speech repeated or reported. The television networks haven’t reported it. The newspapers haven’t reported it. Maybe a few radio talk shows have mentioned it, but nothing like any kind of national coverage or discussion. It’s as if the news outlets are simply ignoring the whole thing, as if what the president said wasn’t anything unusual. But it is very unusual and very significant. We now have a president who is now calling wrong right, and right wrong. Isaiah, the Old Testament, warned against just such a thing, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter,” Isaiah 5:20. I’ll mention just three things about this.

First, beware of those who call evil, good. Isaiah 5:20, “Woe to those who call evil good.” Isaiah gives a warning to anyone who would confuse the categories of moral right and wrong – that’s exactly what president Barack Obama is doing by taking a moral wrong, homosexuality, and confusing it with a moral good, heterosexuality. He’s confusing the moral categories of right and wrong. He’s confusing people about standards of right and wrong. By speaking favorably to a “gay” rights groups, he’s promoting homosexuality as a “right” – as something right, when in fact morally speaking it is wrong, it is a moral wrong. I’ve talked before about the sinfulness of same sex relationships so I won’t take the time to go into that again today, but I’ll just say a few things about the sinfulness or wrongness of homosexual relationships. The Bible, from start to finish, from Genesis to Revelations, says nothing positive about homosexuality, but instead condemns such activity every time it’s mentioned. Again, I don’t have time to go through all the specific evidences in the Bible to prove that it’s wrong, but to simply name a few – there are specific Old Testament laws against same sex relationships such as Leviticus 18:22, “Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.” That’s just one prohibition; there are others. Then there is the example of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 19:1-13, which clearly shows God’s wrath and judgment against the sin of homosexuality. In the New Testament, we have the Apostle Paul’s negative description of homosexuality in Romans 1:18-32 and in lists of sinful practices in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and 1 Timothy 1:8-11. In addition, it has been the universal teaching of the historic Christian church that homosexual acts are sinful. So from the Christian moral perspective homosexuality is wrong; it isn’t right nor is it a right. Yet the president says, “You will see a time in which we as a nation finally recognize relationships between two men or two women as just as real and admirable as relationships between a man and a woman.” With that sentence he equates gay marriage with traditional marriage. Same sex marriage is “just as admirable,” “just as real,” according to the president. To get to that position one must totally disregard everything the Bible teaches on the subject and must also ignore everything the Christian church has ever said about the rightness of marriage and the wrongness of homosexual practices. This is a direct assault not only on Christianity, but also on the values of American and Western Civilization that were built largely upon the Bible and the Christian church. This president seems willing to promote the overthrow of Christian and Western Civilization’s moral values in order to support the homosexual lobby. Well, he may see it as simply payback for their support in electing him president, but we must take these things more seriously than that; because they are serious. We must not follow anyone, including the president, in contradiction to God’s Word. “Woe to those who call evil good,” as Isaiah says. Woe to those who follow such a one. Refuse to go along with the president’s plan; oppose him strongly on this. But that’s not all.

Second, beware of those who call good, evil. Isaiah 5:20, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil.” In the first point I talked about calling evil good, but now let me switch and talk about the dangers of calling good evil. The president not only promotes evil as good – pushing for the wrongness of homosexuality as a right, as right, but he goes even further – he calls those who would refuse to change, those who would uphold Christian moral values, he calls them wrong. He does exactly what the Old Testament prophet Isaiah warns against, “Woe to those who call good evil.” President Obama says, “There are still fellow citizens, perhaps neighbors, even loved one – good and decent people – who hold fast to outworn arguments and old attitudes; who fail to see your families like their families; who would deny you the rights most Americans take for granted.” In other words, there are still people in America who hold fast to old views such as homosexual activity is morally wrong and that marriage is only between a man and a woman – based on the Bible, Christianity and the teachings of the church. He calls the traditional Christian beliefs and arguments based on them as “outworn” and “old.” For the president and “gay” rights advocates, Christian values and beliefs concerning moral rights and wrongs, marriage and values as old and worn-out. It’s his conviction that people need to give up those old worn-out values and beliefs based on the Bible and Christianity; they need to become enlightened with the new secular values he holds and supports. So in other words, he takes something that is clearly wrong – homosexuality – and flips it around in order to make it a right; then, he takes something that is clearly right – moral values of right and wrong based on the Bible, Christianity and Western Civilization, and flips them into something wrong, something wrong to hold because they are based on, in his words, “outworn” and “old” beliefs and thinking. Again, let us hear the warning of Isaiah the prophet, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil.” But we must not fall for the president’s trick. The standard of right and wrong, for truth and error, for true and false is the Bible, not current or popular opinion. As a politician, he may be able to run a campaign or even run his administration based on the opinion polls and popular sentiment or the political trends that come and go, but as responsible Christians we can’t allow politics to determine what is right and wrong for our lives, our families, our society, or our nation. We must resist the pressure that the president is trying to assert for the normalization of homosexuality in our country. We follow a higher law and a higher leader than the president. We will have to give an account to God not man. The Bible’s teachings can be called “worn out” or “old” but that doesn’t change anything; it teaches what is right, good and true. Homosexuality is wrong, according to God; it can never be a right.

Third, beware of those who promote moral relativism. Isaiah 5:20, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” There’s a name for what the president is promoting – it’s called moral relativism. According to this modern, secular philosophy there are no absolute right and wrongs; there are only different persons who hold to different values and beliefs. These values and beliefs are only right or wrong within a certain perspective or context. We can’t judge another person by our own moral standards because they may not hold to our particular values. The best we can do is to tolerate whatever values they hold and expect them to tolerate the values we hold. After all, religious and moral beliefs and values aren’t objective facts anyway; they are only subjective opinions. Therefore, we can’t impose any them on anyone else; we can only believe and live by what we feel is right and wrong, but we can’t expect others to do so. So goes the argument from moral relativism. We hear this argument in the president’s speech; he uses the phrases, “the pursuit of equality” and “for fairness and equality.” He also sees the definition of marriage and family as relative. He says, “Different kinds of families can show the same compassion in a time of need.” The different kinds of families he’s referring to are gay couples raising children. There is no one true definition of marriage and family; it’s all relative, he says. He advocates “standing against those who would enshrine discrimination into our Constitution,” which is really just another criticism of the traditional Judeo-Christian belief that marriage is defined as between a man and a woman, and this definition should be safe-guarded in law through a constitutional amendment. The president’s moral relativism opposes that, since that would be favoring one moral view over another. He asks, “Are we a nation that can transcend old attitudes [Read: traditional Judeo-Christian values] and worn divides [Read: the battle for traditional marriage]?”  He then finishes his speech with sentimental appeal, “It’s about our capacity to love and commit to one another. It’s about whether or not we value as a society that love and commitment.” And if that isn’t enough, he closes with this, “Thank you for your work you’re doing. God bless you. God bless America.” This is a perfect example of religious and moral relativism, and a perfect example of what Isaiah warned against, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” In other words, beware of those who mix everything into the mix to create confusion on every level. The president brings in ethics, but doesn’t believe in any absolute moral values, yet he talks about rights. He brings in love and commitment, but doesn’t link them to any moral context, so they are only words floating subjectively in the hearts and minds of each individual. Finally, he speaks of God and God’s blessings, but clearly from the content of his speech he cares little for the God of the Bible or for God’s moral standards, which he is working against by promoting homosexuality in America. Again, we shouldn’t be surprised by such rhetoric from a politician today, but as far as our own involvement in his agenda, we should reject it and oppose it. Based on everything said in the president’s speech, there is no reason for God to bless America, in fact, if the president’s cause prevails, God has every reason to curse America instead. Let’s refuse to follow along with the president because it goes against our Christian beliefs and convictions.

Title: The Servant Messiah

Text: Matthew 12:15-21

Date: September 20th, 2009

I recently watched a debate on CNN between a conservative evangelical Christian and a liberal religious leader. In an attempt to harmonize Christian values with the agenda of President Obama’s administration, the liberal church leader said that because evangelical Christians are all about “good news” they should welcome the new emphasis on “good news” for the unemployed with greater job growth, the poor with more social assistance programs, and the uninsured with national health care. According to this spokesman, evangelical Christians should welcome all these initiatives because they represent “good news.” But he’s obviously using the phrase “good news” in a loose and general sense, not in the very specific biblical sense of salvation from sin, judgment and damnation. The “good news” or “Gospel” found in the New Testament is a message of spiritual salvation, not just “good news” in any or every sense. For example, what is “good news” to the drug addict? More drugs. Or what is “good news” to an alcoholic? Another drink. To an addict of any kind, “good news” would be more of the same kind of thing that they’ve grown to crave – the fulfillment of their addiction in whatever form that manifests. So then, we see that we can’t simply say that any loose or general application of the phrase “good news” is appropriate. People can get into their minds what they think is good news, but what they think or consider “good news” might not be best in the long term. That’s why we simply can’t equate Christians as promoting anything that comes along that seems to be good news to somebody, because that has nothing to do with what really is good news from a long term or eternal perspective. The salvation of the soul is the ultimate good news, and that is why Christianity preaches the Gospel message, but Christians are not under any obligation to promote simply anything anyone might consider good news because that would take the church far from its primary mission. That’s why I can’t go along with the statement, “Evangelicals are all about good news, and therefore should support all of the Obama administration’s initiatives.” In the short term, it might be “good news” to get a government paycheck, but what are the long-term consequences to out-of-control government spending? What may be “good news” for some people now, might be “bad news” for everybody down the road when the bills come due. The ancient Jews at the time of Christ were also thinking short term when it comes to the promised Messiah. They wanted a conquering hero to free Israel from Roman occupation. They wanted another king like David to rule a free Jewish nation. That’s why most Jews didn’t accept Jesus as Messiah, because he didn’t bring the “good news” of freedom and independence they were wanting. The real “good news” for them would have been a conquering Messiah similar to David; that’s what they wanted Jesus to be. But that wasn’t the “good news” Jesus brought, instead he came with the gospel of freedom from sin, freedom from judgment and freedom from eternal damnation. We see Jesus explaining this in Matthew 12:15-21 (read). Now the question we must ask ourselves today is – are we trying to fit Jesus into our short term expectations about life or are we letting him be our Savior on his own terms? Are we letting Jesus set his own agenda for our lives or are we trying to fit Jesus into our own agenda for life? Let’s look at the passage more closely to find out.

First, Jesus was a different kind of Messiah. Matthew 12:15, “Aware of this, Jesus withdrew from that place. Many followed him, and he healed all their sick, warning them not to tell who he was.” Now the big question is, “Why did Jesus warn them not to tell others who he was?” The most obvious answer is that he wanted to travel freely throughout the country and in the towns, villages and cities of Israel; large crowds would prevent him from traveling freely – as many Gospel passages show this is exactly the problem that did occur in many instances – he wasn’t able to come and go as freely as his ministry required with his increasing notoriety. So from a purely practical standpoint – his ability to move about — he was urging the people not to spread his fame far and wide. But there’s a more profound reason why Jesus discouraged people from publicizing his identity and activities – he didn’t want to add to the already confusing Messiah expectations among the Jews. As I explained before, when the typical Jew heard the word “Messiah” he or she thought of some conquering king like David. They thought when the Messiah came he would liberate the Jews from the Romans through violent revolution and then establish an independent Jewish state where the Jews could then live happily ever after. For the typical Jew, therefore, “good news” would mean the Messiah had come and began to carry out his plan to conquer the enemy and then establish an independent Israel. When people heard about Jesus they immediately expected him to be the long awaited conquering Messiah. In this context, we can begin to understand why Jesus was trying to keep things from getting out of hand by warning people from getting too excited about him as Messiah. He didn’t want them to spread the wrong thing about him; he didn’t want them spreading the word that the conquering Messiah had arrived. Yes, he was the Messiah. Yes, he is the fulfillment of the prophecies of the Old Testament. But he didn’t come to fulfill all the prophecies of the Messiah; he only came to fulfill the most important prophecies concerning forgiveness and salvation. If the Jews knew what was best for them, they’d understand, but they didn’t, because they were thinking immediate and short term, not long term or eternal. Aren’t we all like the Jews in our thinking even today? We have so many short term needs and so we come to the Bible, Christianity, the church, Jesus and God with our pressing, immediate needs and expectations and demand that Jesus fulfill them. Is it any wonder why thousands and thousands of people flock to mega-churches to hear sermons on how to succeed in life, how to meet their emotional needs, how to save their marriage, how to prosper financially, how to fulfill their countless felt-needs? But we need to be careful that we aren’t trying to squeeze Jesus into our expectations rather than let Jesus set our agenda and expectations. Jesus wants to meet our needs but we must let Jesus determine which needs to meet and when to meet them. If we try to push our will upon Jesus instead of letting Jesus work his will, his own way, we are no better than the ancient Jews. Let’s ask the question more, “What is Jesus trying do in my life,” rather than come to Jesus with a “to-do” list for him.

Second, Jesus was a gentle and serving Messiah. Matthew 12:17-20, “This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah: ‘Here is my servant whom I have chosen. I will put my Spirit on him, and he will proclaim justice to the nations. He will not quarrel or cry out; no one will hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out, till he leads justice to victory.’” In contrast to the popular Jewish expectation of the Messiah, Jesus points to the prophet Isaiah to show that he is indeed the fulfillment of prophecy, but that it’s different than the commonly held view. In the passage Jesus quotes, Isaiah is describing a gentle, servant leader who is indeed chosen, called and loved by God, and who indeed is anointed by the Spirit for service – just a different kind of service than the typical Jew was expecting from the Messiah. He will proclaim truth to the nations, but he won’t agitate or march or protest or rally people together as a political force. “No one will hear his voice in the streets.” He won’t be the typical revolutionary who speaks up and speaks out with strong words and loud voice. In other words, he won’t “rally the troops” or stir up the people to political revolution, the way a conquering leader might. “A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.” Or in other words, Jesus won’t conquer through violence or through breaking or snuffing out or through political or military force. The Jews knew of King David and they knew how he operated as conqueror. David was resourceful and capable of bringing victory to Israel through any and every means possible. If violence was need, he brought violence. If cunning and strategy were needed, he employed these. Through shrewd planning and strong execution David conquered, and God was with him in battle, just as God had been with Joshua in battle to conquer the Promised Land. But Jesus was a different kind of Messiah or Deliverer. Upon his first coming to his people, he came as a gentle servant who came primarily to deal with the spiritual separation brought about by sin between the soul and God. Jesus came to deal with the long-term interests of people while often neglecting the short term needs of people. Remember when he said, “The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me.” That is an example of Jesus’ agenda in dealing with spiritual problems first, rather than the thousands of other problems people face. Yes, he did heal the sick and cast out demons and performed miracles, but these were only temporary solutions to temporary human needs. His real agenda was cosmic and eternal; he came to liberate people from the bondage of sin, forgive their sins, rescue them from Judgment Day, and ultimately save their souls from eternal damnation and to eternal happiness in heaven. Again, we are challenged here to let Jesus fulfill his long-term agenda in our lives rather than look to him only as a quick fix or short-term solution to our personal life problems. Yes, Jesus heals our hurts, but he’s so much more than that. Let’s not lose sight of why he’s our Savior; let’s not minimize his role in our lives to fixer-upper. Let’s appreciate his long-term, eternal importance to us.

Third, Jesus is the universal Messiah. Matthew 12:21, “In his name the nations will put their hope.” The mistake the Jews were making was they were not only thinking of the Messiah meeting their own immediate political and economic needs, they were also thinking only in terms of the Messiah meeting Jewish needs. But isn’t God the God of all people? Or at least, shouldn’t God be God of all people? If there is one God and he’s Lord of heaven and earth, shouldn’t all people worship and serve him? And when the Messiah comes, shouldn’t he be concerned about the needs of all people, not just the Jews. But the Jews were thinking only in terms of themselves and their own needs. But the Isaiah prophecy speaks about all people, “In his name the nations will put their hope.” The Jews aren’t the only ones with needs, temporal and universal. But from the Jewish standpoint, the only agenda the Messiah would have was with meeting the needs of the Jews – their liberation from their enemies, their national independence, and their prosperity. But not only are these needs temporary but they are also parochial — they are limited to only one people. But that doesn’t make sense if God is God of heaven and earth. Jesus as the Messiah came to meet the needs of all people, which means his agenda was a lot larger than simply copying the work of King David. Jesus came to set all men free from sin, all who would turn in humble faith, confess their sins, repent, and simply trust God’s grace. Jesus came to bring the Kingdom of God to all people, not just one group in one location at one time. The problem is that the Jews had too narrow thinking about God and the Messiah. It was “all about them.” But Jesus came to save all people, to bring salvation to everyone, Jew and Gentile. His plan called for the fulfillment of the prophecies concerning the Messiah as a servant rather than a conqueror. Yes, the conquering prophecies would find their fulfillment but only later at the end of history. The Jews could only see the end-time conquering fulfillments, but they couldn’t see the servant leader fulfillments. And that’s why they failed to accept and receive Jesus as Messiah – and that’s why they still reject Jesus as Messiah. Their thinking is still too narrow. Now before we are too harshly judgmental of the Jews, let’s think about our own situation as modern day Americans. Don’t we too think a lot about our own situation and ourselves? Aren’t most of our expectations about God made from within our own context? Just like the Jews, we too tend to look to God for short-term fulfillment of our needs, but neglect to see the big picture and what God is trying to accomplish with our lives overall. I’d challenge us all to resist making our Christian faith “all about us.” Resist the temptation to reduce faith to something that “works for me.” Think about the big picture, about ultimate ends, and eternal purposes of God. Let’s all start to live our lives in light of eternity.

Title: Is it Ever Permissible to Break the Law?

Text: Matthew 12:1-14

Date: September 3rd, 2009

Of all the laws among the ancient Jews there were probably no greater number of laws than those surrounding the Sabbath. If you were to accuse the Jews of legalistic religion you could point to no greater example than the Sabbath laws. According to some sources there were at least 39 separate categories of activities forbidden on the Sabbath. Starting from the simple command of God, “Remember the Sabbath to keep it holy,” found in the Ten Commandments, the Jews had multiplied law after law in order to cover nearly every conceivable activity. The Old Testament actually gives only a few instructions on how to keep this law, however that didn’t stop Jewish scribes from working out a whole system of Sabbath law-keeping that defined what this command meant down to the smallest detail. So when Jesus and his disciples thought they were entering a simple grain field looking for something to eat – which was permissible in those days, to eat from someone’s field only enough for oneself – they actually walked into a minefield, because the Jews were ready to fire at them with legalistic laws. The topic for today, then is, is it ever right to break the law? What is the difference between the law of God and the law of man? Is all law strictly absolute or are there exceptions? We need to answer these questions today because as Christians we are confronted with many laws found in both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. How are we to follow all of these laws? Do any of these laws sometimes conflict with one another? If and when they do conflict, which of them are we to obey? Now before I go any further, let me answer a question that some Christians raise in respect to God’s law. “Aren’t we free from the law of God since we are saved by grace alone through the sacrifice of Christ on the cross?” In other words, the question is, “Aren’t we now free from God’s law, aren’t we free from the obligation to obey it?” Well, the answer to that question is yes and no. Yes, we are saved by grace through faith and not by observing the law of God; but no, we are not free from our obligation to live by God’s will or law. It doesn’t save us, our obedience to the law, but it’s our instruction from God how to live, so we must follow it. But the deeper question is, how do we follow all of God’s will, because after all it’s not just a simple thing of following a list of rules. God’s complete law sometimes seems to conflict in life. For example, how do I as a parent balance God’s will for disciplining a child with God’s will to love that child? How strict should a parent be with his or her child? Does every act of disobedience demand punishment or are there exceptions? These are all important questions that Matthew 12:1-14 (read) touches on. The question is not, should we follow God’s law, but the question is, how shall we follow God’s law. Jesus teaches us some very important things to consider. Let’s consider them.

First, there is the law. Matthew 12:1-2, “At that time Jesus went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, ‘Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.’” Exodus 20:8-10 says, “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work. . . .” That was the basic law of God concerning the Sabbath. But by the time of Christ the Jews had defined every possible activity that was and wasn’t permitted on the Sabbath, and what Jesus and his disciples were doing – rubbing grain together in their hands and eating it – that was considered “harvesting grain” by the rabbis and thus considered work, a violation of the Sabbath. Now it’s important to note that the Bible doesn’t say that what they were doing was work and thus a violation of the Sabbath, but the way the command had come to be interpreted and defined made what they were doing a violation. So they were violating the traditions of the Jews rather than actually violating God’s law. But no matter, to a pious Jew it was all the same, law and tradition had become so intertwined that they saw them as one and the same. This should cause us to pause and ask ourselves in our own day, “How much of what I consider God’s law is really tradition rather than command?” There’s nothing wrong with tradition per se, because after all, there is the practical need to define and apply the Bible to our lives, but we just have to be careful that we don’t make our own man-made applications of God’s Word into God’s Word. We need to be able to distinguish what is actually the Word of God or God’s will as stated in the Bible from our own application or interpretation of God’s Word and will for our lives. If we aren’t careful, we too can become like the Pharisees and their hundreds of extra laws that were added to help define and apply God’s law. The truth is, we can be mistaken in our application or we can get carried away in our definitions if we get too detailed in our legal pronouncements. If you want to see a real life example of this, consult “canon law” in the archives of the Roman Catholic Church. I’m not picking on the Catholic Church because every church has it’s own official or unofficial “canon law” by which it makes decisions. But I can think of no greater example today that comes close to the legalism of the ancient Jews. In Rome, in the official archives of Roman Catholic canon law, one can find God’s law defined and applied to the minutest detail, very similar to what the Jews were doing at the time of Christ. We have to come back to what God actually says in his Word and then compare what we’ve made it into over the years and make sure we aren’t confusing the two. The Pharisees did confuse the two; they accused Christ and his disciples of breaking the law, period.

Two, there are the exceptions to the law. Matthew 12:3-7, “He answered, ‘Haven’t you read what David did then he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread – which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. Or haven’t you read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple desecrate the day and yet are innocent? I tell you that one greater than the temple is here. If you had known what these words mean, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice,” you would not have condemned the innocent. For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.’” Jesus responds to the charges of the Pharisees by giving them examples of exceptions to the law found in the Old Testament. Now it wasn’t the intent of Jesus and his disciples neither to uproot the Old Testament law nor to do away with all the traditional definitions and applications of the law formulated by the Jews. But it was his intention to teach a perspective on the law that allowed for the fulfillment of the entire law properly. He wanted to teach the spirit of the law and not just the letter of the law. He points out that David violated the strict letter of the law by eating from the consecrated loaves. He also called their attention to the priests in the temple who “worked” on the Sabbath in performing their religious duties. So what Jesus was doing was pointing out that there are exceptions to the rules, there were special circumstances in which the normal and regular law could be violated without penalty. Now the strict Pharisees didn’t want to admit this because they felt that if there were any exceptions to the law than that would undermine the whole law. They were strict legalists, although they did have to grudgingly admit that the examples Jesus cited were valid, that there sometimes were special circumstances where the law could be broken without penalty. Now how does this apply to us today? It goes to show us that we too must be careful to not judge someone by the normal law unless we see under what circumstances someone else is operating. We can admit a violation of man-made law may sometimes be permissible, but what about a violation of God’s law? Is it ever ok to violate a clear law of God under some special circumstance? Here’s an example that I first heard about at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School where I got my ministry training – if you were a friendly German Christian who was hiding Jews in your house and the Nazis knocked on your door and asked, “Are there any Jews here?” how would you answer? A strict legalistic answer would be to tell the Nazis Jews were in your house, since to lie would be a sin. But most Christians feel that a lie would be permissible under the circumstances and would say, “No, there are no Jews here.” Now that might be the right answer, but why is it so. Let’s find out.

Third, when two laws conflict we should obey the higher law. Matthew 12:9-14, “Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, they asked him, ‘Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?’ He said to them, ‘If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a man than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.’ Then he said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.” Jesus is trying to teach a proper perspective on obedience to the law. Under special circumstances, when two laws are in conflict, we are supposed to obey the higher or priority law over the lower priority law. Jesus gives the example of a sheep stuck in a pit on the Sabbath – is it more important to save the animal or keep the Sabbath law against doing any heavy lifting or work? Clearly, it’s permissible to save the animal. Well, what about healing a man? Is it more important to follow the Sabbath law and not “work” a healing, or is it higher priority to heal? Jesus teaches that it’s more important to do the higher good by healing the man even if it violates the Sabbath. The Pharisees had forgotten about some of the higher laws of God, such as love, mercy, kindness, for example. By focusing on the letter of the law and making that absolute, they were in fact violating the higher laws. This is the point Jesus is making when he says, “If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent.’” The law of love expressed by mercy is of higher priority than simply applying the Sabbath law in a strict, legalistic way. So then how does this apply to our lives today as Christians? We need to remember commands such as “Love they neighbor as you love yourself,” and “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” We need to remember the whole will of God, not just the strict letter of the law. Now, back to the Nazi illustration. I’ve actually heard a well-known radio pastor say that he’d tell the Nazis the truth — that he was hiding Jews, so as not to sin by lying. But almost every Christian I know would probably lie to the Nazi in order to save the Jews. By saving the Jews by lying we would actually be fulfilling the law of love, which is a higher law than strict truth telling. Now remember, this is a special circumstance. You can’t use this principle to break God’s law whenever and wherever you’d like. But what Jesus is teaching us is that whenever there is a higher law, we need to obey that law rather than strictly fulfill the lesser law. David feeds his soldiers with unlawful bread because the higher law is to feed the hungry. The priests in the temple “work” on the Sabbath because the higher law is to serve God’s people when they come for worship. Jesus “works” a healing on the Sabbath because it’s more important to fulfill the law of love than obey the lesser law of abstaining from work.

What this means for us today is that we need to keep the whole law of God, that is, we need to pay attention to the complete will of God, not just focus only on the details of the laws that are spelled out in black and white. Now Jesus is not giving us an excuse to sin or disobey God’s law, but rather he’s showing us that we need to think in terms of the whole of God’s law, not just certain ones. He’s also showing us that there is a priority to God’s will, that not all of the law of God is of equal importance, and that we need to make sure we aren’t violating a higher priority law when we obey a lesser law. The Jews and all legalists are confused on this point. They think that a law is a law and that all laws are of equal value and priority. That is false. There are higher laws and there are lesser laws. We are supposed to obey all the laws of God – even the lesser laws – unless there is a higher law of God that requires our obedience first. If we’re required to obey all the laws of God at all times we couldn’t do it because sometimes these laws conflict, like I’ve demonstrated from the illustrations. But we aren’t required to obey all of God’s laws all the time if there is a conflict; we are required to obey the higher laws first and then if we can obey the lesser laws, but if we have to choose between the two, we should obey what is most important or is of higher priority. I’ll give you a modern day example of how it was proper and right to tell a lie in order to do right. There were two young women camping in the woods and one night they heard someone outside their camper. They went to the door and opened it slightly and saw two rough looking men who looked suspicious. Their story was that they needed the help of the women to drive them into town because their own car had broken down on the road. The women didn’t believe the men and so they told them they couldn’t help them right then because they and their husbands were tired after hiking all day, it was late and they were almost asleep. After the men left, the women quickly packed up the camper and drove out of there. They heard on the news the next day that there were two men wanted for assault in that same area. Now those two women lied to those two men, but it was justified because of the circumstances. Is a Christian obligated to tell the truth to a criminal intent on hurting them? No. But a Christian is obligated to think of the safety of someone with them and even their own safety. Now a legalist would no doubt have to reveal the fact that it was just two women alone in the woods camping, because of the command “Do not bear false witness,” or in other words, always tell the truth, don’t lie. But a Christian who takes into consideration the whole law or the will of God would protect the person they are with and even him or herself by not telling the truth in this circumstance. But again, this principle can’t be used to sin or disobey God’s law whenever or in whatever circumstances. No. It is only when a higher law must be obeyed that we should disobey a lesser law. This is what Jesus is trying to teach in this passage.

Title: Jesus Offers Relief for the Weary Modern World

Text: Matthew 11:28-30

Date: September 2nd, 2009

Today we come to one of the most comforting of all teachings of Jesus in the New Testament. Unlike many or most Christian churches today, we just can’t go through the Bible preaching and teaching the sweet and pleasant verses while at the same time omitting and ignoring the difficult ones. That’s what congregations seem to want these days — all sweet and no sour – but we can’t do that and be faithful to the whole revelation of God taught in the Bible. No, we must state the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, as we are reminded each time someone is “sworn in” to give testimony in a court. So too we must hear the entire message God gives from his Word without editing out unpleasant parts or teaching exclusively from pleasant passages. And that’s the balance I try to maintain in my ministry – actually it’s easy to keep such a balance when I’m teaching verse-by-verse through a book or section of the Bible, because if I’m accurately explaining each verse there will be a balance between sweet and sour truths. But today we come upon one of the more pleasant passages in all of God’s Word, the invitation of Christ Jesus for everyone to find rest for their soul in him. That’s good news for a weary world like we live in today. The pace of life is so fast today, it seems like everyone is always so busy. And there is also lots of pressure today that wasn’t present in times past. Someone once observed that with all our laborsaving devices such as the washing machine, dishwasher, microwave, for example, that we have more time not less time for everything we desire to do. Wrong. When we get more time we quickly fill it up with something else so that we are just as busy as we ever were, only now we actually have more things to do! But it’s not just the pace of life that’s a problem today, it’s the way of life that even more troubling. As faith in God and obedience to his will slips more and more in society, as we try to live our lives on our own terms rather than God’s, we suffer a lose of meaning and purpose at the center of our lives. Our lives become hollow and empty. This may be the biggest problem facing the modern world today. It’s not so much that we are tired of activity as much as we are tired at the core of our being because we are more and more losing the very point and purpose of life. Our modern problem is truly a spiritual problem but few people identify it as spiritual. Most people today think it’s psychological – so they visit a counselor or therapist to get themselves fixed. They complain of a lack of drive or motivation, or low self-esteem, or depression or anxiety, for example, but the real problem stems from a lack of meaning and purpose because they’ve ignored God and God’s Word. They’ve substituted other things for God in their lives and wonder why they are so empty. But even Christians can get off track and begin substituting other things for God at the center of their lives, so the malady isn’t limited to non-Christians by any means. What is needed is a re-centering of God in our lives. God must be front and center in our lives, not just in theory but also in fact. Only then can we feel the peace and security he offers us through his Spirit, only then can our lives be properly ordered so that meaning and purpose flow from God at the center outward into every activity we involve ourselves in. That’s what Jesus invites us to in this passage. That’s what is such good news. Let’s explore it further.

First, Jesus invites a weary people to rest. Matthew 11:28, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give your rest.” Do you know what it means to be weary or burdened? Sure we do. But if we don’t have enough examples in our own lives, it’s easy to see weariness and burden in the lives of those around us. Take for example marriages. For all of our education, ability and know-how in the modern world, we fail at marriages at a higher rate than any people ever in the history of the world. Why are people so weary and burdened about their marriages today, whether divorced or not? From the number of marriage experts and marriage instructional books and seminars you’d think that we’d be people who are so informed and enlightened on the subject that we’d experience better marriages and more successful relationships than people of the past. But no, with all our marriage knowledge and wisdom we fail even more than past generations who knew less about the science of marriage. Why? Because we’ve substituted “self” for God in the center of our lives and we are trying to live lives apart from God and God’s Word in our lives. We live by our own abilities and resources and knowledge apart from God’s leadership, and the results are terrible. Marriages fall apart, families split apart, and lives are ruined. But that’s just one area of modern life; there are many other aspects of life today that cause burden and weariness in the human spirit. Financial pressure is another area. It didn’t take an economic recession to burden our hearts over money, but the recession only compounds the problem. Materialism and money dominate life today for most people. Even though we live at a higher standard of living than people of the past, we pay for it in increased pressure and anxiety. Most families are only a few paychecks away from financial disaster, and the knowledge of this causes burden on the human spirit. No wonder so many people look tired and weary – they are, just trying to keep their heads above water financially, especially with so much credit and debt. I could go on naming the areas of anxiety and burden in our modern lives today, but I don’t want to burden you all with more discouragement and depression, that’s not my intent. But I say all this to simply underscore the fact that when Jesus invites us to rest in him, that’s really good news because we need rest for our weary souls. We need inner peace that can only come through a living relationship with God through Jesus Christ. We simply can’t ignore God or remove him from the center of our lives and have the peace and blessing that only he can give. Now some people who haven’t experienced the peace of God in their lives don’t believe it’s possible. They need to take Jesus up on his offer and experience it for themselves. Others have experienced the peace of Jesus in their life before but they’ve gotten distracted, much like the parable of the sower describes where the weeds and cares of life rob the seed from growing into a healthy plant. They need to once again commit themselves to Jesus by making him the center of their life in order to experience his blessings in their heart. So Jesus invites us to peace of mind and soul. Isn’t that good news today? But how do we make Jesus the center of our life? Let’s find out. 

Second, God’s peace and rest is found through becoming a disciple of Jesus. Matthew 11:29, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Here is a paradox – the way to find rest for your soul is to take on the labor of love in following Jesus as a disciple. Jesus invites us to peace of mind and rest for our weary and burdened souls, then he tells us how to do it – take upon ourselves his yoke and learn from him. Or in other words, he calls us to work and study. But wait! How is that restful and peaceful? When we think of rest we usually don’t think of more work or more study; these are the kinds of activities that cause weariness and make us tired. How can Jesus invite us to rest with these kinds of activities? I told you that Jesus is teaching us a paradox, or in other words, something that seems totally contrary. It’s true. According to Jesus, the way to have peace and rest in our deepest place, our spirit, our soul, is to commit ourselves to following him as a disciple, taking on that burden or responsibility. The Greek word used in this verse translated “learn from me” is actually the word for disciple, mathete. So we could translate the verse, “Take my yoke upon you and become my disciple,” or “Follow me as a disciple.” And in so doing, we will, Jesus promises, find rest for our souls. Now that’s a paradox because it calls weary and tired people into another kind of labor – discipleship or following Jesus. As modern American Christians we don’t know a lot about discipleship in the Christian life; past generations knew something about it, but we’ve been raised on a kind of Christianity that settles for affirming doctrines and some minimal commitment to regular church attendance and giving. But the early disciples of Jesus followed Jesus and practiced the disciplines of discipleship; they made a commitment to God not only to believe certain things about him, but also to practice certain things in devotion to him. The basics of discipleship are regular daily prayer, every day Bible study, regular church attendance and a few more other things that in years past every real Christian new were required. Today, however, we practice a kind of minimal faith that really doesn’t require much other than our signing up and not doing anything that would get us kicked out! But if we want to have rest for our souls and peace of mind and experience the blessings of God at the center of our lives, we got to be willing to accept Jesus’ challenge to “take my yoke upon you and learn from me.” But how can Jesus seriously invite already burdened people to take upon themselves another burden, his yoke? Because his burden, his yoke, puts God in the center of our lives so that we aren’t living from our own ability but rather we are living from God’s ability. You see the problem with life in the modern world isn’t that we are too burdened; the problem is that we are trying to live apart from God and we are trying to carry our own weight. We need to become a disciple of Jesus, take upon ourselves his burden or yoke of following him, and experience the blessing of God directing and empowering our lives. Are you willing to become a disciple of Jesus? Are you willing to take on that responsibility? Let me explain why it makes good sense.

Third, compared to the burden of sin and self, Christ’s discipleship burden is light. Matthew 11:30, “For my yoke is easy and my burden in light.” Now notice Jesus doesn’t invite us to a life with no burden. He doesn’t say, “You who are already overburdened, come to me and I’ll unburden you so that you won’t have to carry any load.” No. He invites us all to take up a different burden, a different kind of burden and a different size burden. You see, in reality the burden of sin and self-centeredness is really heavy, unbearable. Compared with the burden of selfishness and sin, the burden Christ invites us to is light. That’s why Jesus says, “For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Life comes with some kind of burden. It’s unrealistic to think that life comes with no burden, no weight of responsibility, no commitment, no concern, it’s just that we should be careful as to what burden we bear in life. Sin and self-centered living comes with a heavy burden; being a disciple of Jesus and bearing the responsibility that entails is better, superior than the burden of sin and selfishness. And that’s the irony. You’d think that if you were free to pick your own burden and you picked the self-directed life, the self-centered life, you’d think that you’d organize things to your own self-satisfaction. But that’s not the case. Wasn’t it Jesus who said, “Whoever would find his lose will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and the gospel, will find it.” Again, paradox, counter intuitive. When we become a convert of Jesus and follow after him as a disciple, that is, someone who believes what Jesus teaches and does what Jesus commands, we are paradoxically liberated and unburdened. Yet when we live for self and sin, when we reject God at the center of our life, we become a slave to ourselves and over burden ourselves. Our yoke is heavy, our burden is great. It’s better to make the commitment to follow Christ in obedience and serve him than it is to rebel against God and serve self. Apart from God we are all lousy organizers of our own lives in every way. But with God as the center of our lives, we not only are directed down the right path, we are instructed as to how to walk down the right path. Discipleship takes commitment; there is no doubt about that. Some people balk at the idea of spiritual disciplines like prayer, Bible study, church participation, giving, witnessing, spiritual and moral accountability, for example. They don’t realize that without taking upon themselves the burden or yoke of Christ as a disciple they are consigning themselves to a life burdened by sin and selfishness, which is far heavier than anything Christ ever asks of us. Speaking from experience, I follow spiritual disciplines and I see it as the heart of discipleship. It’s not a heavy burden for me; it’s normally something I enjoy. Sure, there are times when it’s hard for me to follow all the disciplines all the time, but I don’t see it as something legalistic, but something that’s a blessing. I hope you grasp the importance of being a disciple of Jesus if you aren’t one already.

The easiest way to become a real disciple of Jesus Christ is to find a good church, like this one if I may say so, and sign up for the membership class, which really could be called a discipleship class, because that’s what it really is, at least a basic discipleship class. Membership in a local church should be from start to finish a discipleship experience. According to the passage I’ve been examining, Jesus invites us to unburden ourselves, to lay our burdens down by taking upon ourselves his burden of becoming a disciple. Why? Because his burden of discipleship is easier and lighter than our own selfish, sinful life apart from God. Sin pays a heavy toll that few people realize. Sloppy Christianity pays a heavy toll and burden on people also because it’s basically a situation where a person has one foot in the kingdom of God and one foot back in the world. It’s the perfect example of the “double-minded man” that James describes. It’s so much better to clearly put God in the center of our life and leave him there. But that’s the problem – we need help in keeping God in the center of our life, because even as Christians we are susceptible to wandering off. Remember the words of the old hymns, “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the one I love.” That’s a description of a Christian being tempted to drift back into sin or worldliness or the flesh or a self-centered life. So we need help in keeping God in the center of our life. That’s where the church comes in, that community of fellow believers who all want to live for Jesus and follow him as disciples. When a group of people all dedicate themselves to following the Lord Jesus in word and deed, they then make a covenant between themselves to help encourage each other and hold each other accountable for living the Christian life. Ok, here we see again, the yoke or burden aspect of discipleship. It’s easier to remain free and without accountability. Who likes to be accountable to anybody for anything? Wouldn’t it just be easier to not go through that or join any church community or make any commitment to believe or live a certain way? Yes, it would be easier to live without making a public, community commitment to follow Jesus, but then that wouldn’t be discipleship. Jesus said there’d be a yoke, a burden, but he also said that it would be light and easy compared with living apart from God and God’s people in sin and self-centeredness. Now I ask you, are you a disciple of Jesus Christ in community with other Christians who can encourage you and hold you accountable? Are you part of a church that takes Christ’s call to discipleship seriously? If not, how are you going to keep God center in your life without the help of other Christians? You can’t, you were never meant to, apart from the church. I’d like to challenge you to find a good, solid church and join in together with others in the discipleship process Jesus calls us to. Join the church, make the commitment, take this burden upon you, because it’s light and easy compared with the burden and yoke of sin and selfishness outside the church.

Title: Jesus – The Only Way

Text: Matthew 11:27

Date: September 1st, 2009

One of the really exciting things about the Bible is the way it can teach us so much from just one verse! That’s what we have today as we work verse-by-verse through the Gospel of Matthew. “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him,” Matthew 11:27. This verse shows what theologians call “the exclusivity of Christ,” or in other words, how Christ is the only way to God. I’m aware that this is a disputed fact among people of the world today; it’s even being questioned by some so-called Christians as well. Today, it’s popular to say that all religions are different paths to God. All faiths are valid as long as they are sincerely held. To claim that Christ or Christianity is the only way to God smacks of bigotry and narrow-mindedness. But if we are honest to God’s Word, if we are consistent with unanimous biblical teaching, we must agree that Jesus Christ is the only way to have access to God the Father in heaven. Now that doesn’t answer all the questions the critics have concerning the relationship between Christianity and all the other religions and philosophies of the world, but it does accurately express the Bible’s teaching on the subject. And Matthew 11:27 is just one of many passages that teach the exclusivity of Christ for salvation. There are others. For example there is the famous passage where Jesus clearly states, “I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me.” That’s pretty clear. Another example of the exclusivity of Christ is found in Acts 4:12, where the apostles make this claim, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” I could give still other passages in the New Testament to support the exclusivity of Christ, but I’ve mentioned enough to prove the point – the Bible teaches that Jesus Christ is the only way to God, the only way of salvation. But what about all the people from all the other religions? Can they be saved following their own religion sincerely? That’s what most religious leaders like the Dali Lama teach. For example, in countless interviews he has expressed the belief that for him Buddhism is the religion of choice, but for someone born in a predominantly Muslim society, Islam would be just as valid a choice. For someone born in a majority Christian society, Christ could be the way of salvation for him or her. He teaches the relativity of all religion. Or, in other words, all religions, if sincerely believed and practiced, can lead a person to God and the way of salvation. This view is fast becoming the view of most people today, although the Bible contradicts it. Just what does the Bible teach about Jesus Christ and the way of salvation? Does it really teach that Jesus is the only way? Let’s look at Matthew 11:27 and find out.

First, God has committed everything to Jesus Christ. Matthew 11:27, “All things have been committed to me by my Father. . . .” The Greek word used here is paredothe, which means to “hand over.” God the Father has “handed over” all things to God the Son, Jesus Christ. Now what thing is he speaking of? All created things. In John 1:1-3, 10 we learn, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. . . . He (Jesus) was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.” So we see that Jesus, God the Son, second person of the Holy Trinity, was with God the Father, first person of the Holy Trinity, along with the Holy Spirit, third person of the Holy Trinity, who is mentioned “in the beginning” at creation in Genesis 1, creating the universe and the world. All of creation has been assigned or entrusted to Jesus by the Father. Now that makes perfect sense because Jesus is God-in-human-flesh, while God the Father is pure Spirit along with the Holy Spirit, who is, well, pure Spirit. But the Son Jesus is accessible to us because he expresses himself in ways we as humans can comprehend. The Jehovah Witnesses, the false religious cult that knocks on doors, passes out literature, and criticizes all other churches than their own, these people have the heretical teaching that there are two gods – one, God the Father, who is truly God; and second, god the son, Jesus, who is really a created god assigned to administer and organize this universe and world for God the Father. Well, that’s incorrect; in fact, it’s a false teaching. But where they got it wrong is that Jesus isn’t a created little god under the Big God the Father. Jesus was never created; instead, he’s always been around because he, along with the Father and the Spirit is also God. But the JW’s have it right in that Jesus has been assigned to administer or organize the universe and our world. God the Father has entrusted this responsibility to him as this verse says, “All things have been committed to me by my Father.” But we begin to see the exclusivity of Christ doctrine clearly from this passage. God the Father entrusts all things to Jesus, not the Buddha, not Confucius, not Mohammed, or any other religious leader. The Father, who is also the God of the Jews, didn’t even entrust all things to any Old Testament Jewish leader, but only to Jesus Christ. So how can there be any comparison between Jesus and anybody else? Jesus is eternal; no other religious leader can make that claim. Jesus is co-creator of all things along with the Father and Spirit; no other spiritual leader can claim such a thing. When Jesus is compared to anyone, any leader, religious or otherwise, there is no real comparison. Jesus is totally and absolutely unique. There isn’t even a close second. That’s a clue to why only Jesus is the way to God, only Jesus is the way to salvation.

Second, only Jesus the Son knows God the Father. Matthew 11:27, “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son. . . .” Now it’s not saying that it’s impossible to learn or know something about God outside of Christianity or the Bible. It’s possible to know some things about God through natural means. For example, in the Book of Romans, the Apostle Paul teaches, “Since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understand from what has been made, so that men are without excuse,” Romans 1:19-20. It’s possible to learn about God from nature; this is called natural theology. It’s also possible to know about God from human nature, through our moral conscience. Again, the Apostle Paul teaches, “. . . men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves due penalty for their perversion,” Romans 1:27. The human conscience is a testimony to the moral law of God; it witnesses to us that there is a God and that there are moral standards of right and wrong which all men and women are obligated to follow. If they violate these standards they feel guilt and shame – that’s one of the things this passage is speaking to – a guilty conscience. This is the basis for all natural ethics, and it’s amazing to see that all religions and all philosophies have moral standards. Even if they disagree on what those standards are, still they all have them to one degree or another. So Matthew 11:27 isn’t teaching that it’s impossible to know about God through nature or even through different religions or philosophies, it’s just saying that impossible to “know” God in a personal sense except through Jesus Christ. The Greek word used here is epiginoskei, which means personal knowing, not just general or abstract knowing. I can know about some celebrity or television personality through watching or reading about them, but I can’t personally know they unless I meet them and interact with them closer. It’s the same way with God. It’s possible to learn about God and know about God through natural theology or even through the writings of some of the famous religious leaders like Mohammed, for example. The truth is, Mohammed borrowed most of his religious ideas from Jews and Christians and simply recorded these along with adding some other teachings he came up with to create the Koran and the teachings of Islam. It’s possible to learn about God from different religions but it’s not possible to personally “know” God except through a spiritual relationship with Jesus Christ. “No one knows the Father except the Son.” That means, no other religious leader is qualified to teach us about God except Jesus Christ. Yes, it is true that there were Old Testament saints who knew God personally, who spoke with God, such as Moses. But as far as intimate knowledge of God the Father, only the Son knows God in that way. Why would anyone listen to any other spiritual leader or follow any other religion in place of Jesus and Christianity, since these other leaders and religions teach errors and contradictions about God because they don’t know him like Jesus knows him.

Third, only a Christian can truly know God. Matthew 11:27, “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” Here’s the key phrase which brings out the exclusivity of Christ and the exclusivity of Christianity as the one true faith, “No one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal himself.” Jesus is the exclusive spiritual leader; only he can reveal God to the world. And Christianity is the only true faith because Christ has revealed God to people called Christians, to the Christian church. Why is the Christian church the only true faith? Because it is to Christians that the Son “chooses to reveal him (God)” – that is why we are called a Christian, because God has chosen to reveal himself to us through his Son Jesus. There would be no Christianity, there would be no Christian church, if God hadn’t entrusted all things to Christ, if Christ didn’t know God the Father, and, if Christ didn’t reveal God the Father to those who are called Christians. It isn’t that God reveals himself to people called Christians; it’s God reveals himself to people and because of this revelation they come to know God and are called Christians. Now there are many different religions that claim to know about God. Buddhists and Hindus, for example, claim to know things about God; they are all confused and contradictory things about God. For example, Buddhists aren’t sure whether there really is a God or if there is what kind of God there is. Hindus, on the other hand, believe there are many gods, thousands of gods, but they don’t know anything about the one, true God. Or as another example, Muslims believe they know something about God; they believe that there is one God. In this they are correct. But that’s about as far as it goes with them because from the writings found in the Koran it’s clear that they know very little personally about God, nor can they have much of a personal, living relationship with God. This follows from what Jesus teaches about himself and God the Father – “No one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” Jesus is not revealing God the Father to Muslims because they reject his essential identity and teachings. And because Jesus is not revealing God to Muslims, they can’t personally know God. Neither can Buddhists and Hindus personally know God, the true God, because Jesus is not revealing the God the Father to them because they won’t give up their own false ideas about God long enough to listen to the Christian Gospel and the message of the Bible. The truth is, Jesus would reveal God to all people if they would but turn away from their false religious beliefs and accept the truth of God as Jesus teaches and as Christianity preaches.

I feel sorry, for example, for Muslims who might really get to know God except they are unwilling to disbelieve the teachings of their so-called prophet Mohammed. Muslims dishonor Jesus by making their false prophet out to be greater than Jesus. In their famous prayer, they say, “There is only one God and Mohammed is his prophet.” So in other words, if they only say two things about God it’s that there is one God and Mohammed is prophet. What about Jesus? Why speak of Mohammed ahead of Jesus? Why make Mohammed as God’s last voice or revelation? Jesus is the key to know God, not Mohammed. So we can easily see, because Matthew 11:27 is true, Islam is a false religion. “No one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” It isn’t the case that Mohammed knows God, nor is it the case that he can reveal God to mankind. The low place that Jesus is given in Islam is an insult to God. The high place that Mohammed is given in Islam is also an insult to the true God. The low place Jesus is given in Buddhism is an insult to God also because among Buddhists, such as the Dali Lama, all religions lead to God. Well, if all religions are paths to God, then why did Jesus need to come to the earth and suffer and die on the cross? If people can be saved through the Hindu religion or the Buddhist religion, why would God send or even permit Jesus to die for the sins of the world? The prayer of Jesus in Gethsemane shows the exclusivity of Christ, “Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will,’” Matthew 26:39. If there were other ways to God, if were not necessary for Jesus to die for the sins of the world, that would have been the perfect time for God to intervene – “Jesus, stop, you don’t have to die for the sins of the world, for the salvation of mankind, there are other ways, other alternative paths for me to accomplish that.” But no, God didn’t rescue Christ Jesus because there were no other paths to knowing God, no other ways of salvation. That means that all the other religions and philosophies of the world, ancient or modern, can’t save the soul. There are no alternative ways of knowing God. There aren’t many paths to salvation, as the Dali Lama continually teaches. No. There is one and only one way to personally know God and be saved by God — that is through the Son Jesus Christ, as this short passage teaches. Now this passage leaves unanswered all the many questions that come from saying Jesus is the only way. Is it fair for God to save only through Jesus when many others might not have heard the Gospel? What happens to all those people in the world who follow different religions? The Bible doesn’t answer all our questions about truth and error, true faith and false faith, saved and unsaved. But what it does say very clearly is that salvation is though Christ alone by grace alone through faith alone.

Title: Interpreting the Bible Correctly

Text: Deuteronomy 29:29, Matthew 3:5-7, Daniel 9:2

Date: August 15th, 2009

I’ve been teaching on the Bible for the last few weeks, covering such topics as why there are no real errors or contradictions in the Bible, only apparent problems. I also taught about how divine inspiration works in connection with the human authors of the biblical books and showed how God assigned each writer a prophetic task to communicate his Word using their own language and styles, while keeping them from any errors of any kind in the process. Today, I’d like to focus in on how to read and interpret the Bible. It does us no good if we totally believe in the divine inspiration, inerrancy and infallibility of the Bible, yet read it sloppily and interpret it incorrectly. It’s critical that we read, interpret and apply the Bible correctly in order to believe and live by its truth in our lives. This is one of the major problems in the Christian church today and in the lives of Christians today – the misinterpretation and misapplication of the Bible. There are countless churches which hold strongly to the doctrine of divine inspiration and infallibility of the Bible, yet err in their interpretation and application of it. There are Christian colleges and seminaries which hold to both inerrancy and infallibility of the Bible, training Christians to be influential leaders, yet permit administration and faculty members to operate under false and corrupt interpretations; thus practically nullifying any advantages of holding to an inerrant and infallible Bible. As they say, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. If Christian leaders, churches and Christian institutions hold to biblical inerrancy and infallibility in theory, yet in practice permit wild and irresponsible interpretations of the Bible to spread within their circles of influence the end result is often the same as if no inerrancy or infallibility were held at all to begin with. The end result is the same – false doctrine and improper behavior. So it’s critically important that basic rules of correct biblical interpretation be followed within Christianity. The good news is that the basic rules of interpreting the Bible are not difficult or complex; they are simple, and once learned, can be applied always and everywhere. So today, I’d like to outline just a few basic rules of biblical interpretation that will help Christians read, interpret and apply the truth of the Bible correctly. Not that there will ever be 100% agreement on every interpretation of every biblical passage, but at least the ground rules for interpreting can be agreed upon, which goes a long way in bringing about unity and truth within the Christian church. Today, I’ll only mention three basic rules for interpreting the Bible. First, the plain or common sense rule. Second, the rule of context. And third, the harmony rule. Three simple guidelines for interpreting the Bible that will eliminate most misinterpretations. I’ll mention a few other rules, but cover only these three in any detail.

First, there’s the plain or literal sense rule of interpretation. Deuteronomy 29:29, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of the law.” It is the purpose and intent of God in giving us revelation that it be understood plainly. It does us no good to have revelation from God but not in any form we can understand. So it’s just common sense that if God gives us revelation of himself, his creation, his will, for example, that it be in a form that can be plainly understood by the average person. This makes sense in the context of divine revelation given through the languages and personalities of the inspired prophets. The Bible was not given specifically to philosophers or scholars, although it can and should be studied by the best minds. It was given to regular people to understand God’s will for their lives. So then, if the Bible is given first and foremost for the average or regular person, it makes sense that it should be interpreted in a common sense or literal or straight forward way primarily. But this is just how we go about interpreting almost any kind of document, or at least this is how we should begin to approach the challenge of understanding a written document of any kind. The above passage from the Old Testament given through the writings of Moses, the great leader and prophet, states that hidden or secret or mysterious things of God are beyond our understanding; we have no claim upon these things. But the things that God has revealed to us through divine inspiration and recorded in the sacred writings, these things are ours to read, interpret and apply to our lives for the glory of God. And if God is revealing things to us through divine, prophetic writings, then we can expect them to be in legible and comprehensible form. That’s the basis for the plain or literal or common sense rule of biblical interpretation. John Wesley once said, “In interpreting the Bible, seek no further sense than the plain sense, if the plain sense makes sense.” We shouldn’t suppose we can go to the Bible and, for example, open it up at random, close our eyes, stick our finger in the middle of the page, read the sentence where our finger lands, and expect to get a revelation from God personally for us using this subjective method. That’s not a responsible way to interpret the Bible. The plain sense rule means that we read a passage of the Bible in the sense, as best we can, of the author’s intent in writing it. If a biblical writer is recounting history, then we should read it historically – the plain sense meaning. If the biblical author is teaching, then we should read it as teaching. If the biblical passage is poetic, then it’s only common sense to interpret it in a poetical way, not a literal way. Now most of the Bible is recorded in the literal sense, and so we must interpret most of the Bible in a literal sense. But some passages are clearly non-literal, for example, figures of speech and poetry. In these cases, we must use our own common sense and realize that the author is trying to get us to see things in a different way, so then we interpret the passage in a different way, or in the way the author wants us to read it. Sometimes this is not always crystal clear, but most of the time it is, so we shouldn’t have any problem most of the time. There will be times where honest disagreement will occur between good Christians trying to interpret the same passage in different ways, but these instances aren’t as common as it might seem. The rule is to interpret the Bible in its most plain, common sense way, and then, only if it doesn’t make sense, to seek some other sense.

Second, there’s the rule of context in interpreting the Bible. Matthew 3:5-7, “Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. ‘If you are the Son of God,’ he said, ‘throw yourself down. For it is written, “he will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”’  Jesus answered him, ‘It is also written, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”’” Here is an example of the devil ripping a biblical passage from its context and trying to misapply it. We see Jesus immediately correct this misinterpretation from a passage in context. But the dangers of interpreting the Bible out of context are still alive today. In fact, probably most misinterpretations of the Bible occur from someone interpreting it out of context. And it’s easy to do because the Bible is a big book with many different contexts. It’s easy to pull a passage out of its original context and apply it to something completely different. But that’s where errors and confusion come from because once a biblical truth is removed from its original context almost anything can happen – and it’s usually bad! In tempting Jesus, the devil tried to use the Bible to support his will, but he was misusing the Bible instead. But it’s a common misuse of the Bible because people don’t usually take the time and have the patience to make sure they are interpreting the Bible within its proper context. A good example is the classic difficulty between the teachings of the Apostle Paul and James in the New Testament. Both are teaching about faith, but without a close evaluation of the context of their teachings it appears that they contradict each other.  But this contradiction is only apparent because upon a closer examination of the biblical context in which each was writing, it becomes clear that the Apostle Paul is talking about faith before God while James is talking about faith before other people. For James, “faith without works is dead,” to which Paul would agree, although writing within a different context, Paul would not state it this way. In the context of Paul’s teachings, we are saved “by faith alone,” that is, before the eyes of God, our faith is counted as righteousness. But in the context of James’ teaching, that context being before the eyes of men in respect to the evidences or expressions of genuine internal faith, “faith without works is dead.” It’s all about context. And this is just one example of how important and sometimes how tricky determining the context can be. In difficult passages it’s hard to determine the exact context, but we must make every effort we can to determine the correct context for every passage we are trying to interpret. What is the historical context? What is the topical context? What is the general context? What is the specific context? We need to keep asking contextual questions so that we understand the setting for the passage we are trying to understanding. Now the good part is that there are many good Bible helps, books, commentaries and encyclopedias, for example, which can help us understand the context of a biblical passage. Once we have an idea what the context is, we can then make an intelligent interpretation and application of the truth.

Third, there’s the rule of scripture interpreting scripture. Daniel 9:2, “I, Daniel, understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the Lord given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years.” Here we see one biblical prophet, Daniel, reading another biblical prophet, Jeremiah. So in reading this passage we are using one prophetic book of the Bible to understand another prophetic book of the Bible. And that’s exactly what this third rule of biblical interpret is – scripture interpreting scripture. The assumption is that the Bible as a whole is in complete harmony with itself from beginning to end. The Jews always used scripture to interpret scripture because they, like the early Christian believers, saw the Bible as a harmonious whole, not a fragmented division. Modern skeptical scholars seek to divide the Bible, even attempting to divide individual books of the Bible, inserting anonymous authors here and there, tracing invisible sources, and generally seeing the Bible as the mere product of human cutting and pasting. Operating within this skeptical framework it’s no wonder that they are eager to seek out alleged errors and contradictions. But in order to properly interpret the Bible we must approach it as it presents itself – as a unified whole. That means we let scripture interpret scripture. We seek to harmonize the parts with the whole – and the whole with the parts. For example, in interpreting the Old Testament, we look to see how the New Testament interprets the Old Testament. We look to see how Jesus, the apostles and their associates interpreted the Old Testament, with the general understanding that because of Jesus’ claim to be Lord and God he above all persons would know proper biblical interpretation, and that he would pass down truth to his apostles in the process as recorded in the New Testament. Thus, another rule of interpretation would be — always interpret the Old Testament in the light of the New Testament, never the reverse. But even within the New Testament we should let scripture interpret scripture. For example, if a biblical author is explaining a specific truth in detail, for example, saving faith, we should let what is most clear explain what is least clear. In this respect, we find the Apostle Paul explaining saving faith most clearly, so we let him explain and define faith and interpret the rest of the New Testament in light of his explanation. We don’t go to less clear passages about faith, for example, The Book of James, and explain Paul in light of James. We let the brightest lights in scripture shine on the lesser lights and bring visibility that way. We also try to understand everything in the Bible in light of everything else in the Bible. This is sometimes called systematic theology. Since “all scripture is given by inspiration of God,” the assumption is that it’s there for a purpose and it all contributes to clarify for us the will of God.

There are other rules of biblical interpretation that I don’t have time to go into today, but maybe in another teaching coming up. For example, there is the principle of precedent, or as they call in the legal field “stare decisis” – a Latin phrase meaning, as it stands, which simply means, if Christians everywhere, at all times, by everyone, have interpreted a passage in a certain way that’s pretty strong weight that it should be interpreted that way. Now this is not an infallible rule, because it’s possible that all Christians everywhere at all times could be wrong, but that’s highly unlikely. I don’t believe Christians today think enough in terms of historical Christian precedent when interpreting the Bible. If the Bible teaches something and early Christians interpret the Bible to mean what it seems to teach and nearly all Christians down through 2000 years of church history have interpreted the Bible in the same way, it’s really hard to imagine how modern Christian could come along and say, “Hey, we have a new interpretation and everybody else has been wrong for 2000 years and even the plain sense meaning of scripture is wrong.” That to me is too far fetched to believe. Yet today, that’s exactly what many modern Christians are doing, for example, on passages that teach the man is the head of the home and wives are to submit to their husband as leader in the marriage. Many contemporary churches are now teaching that these passages don’t teach that the man is the head of the house or nor that wives need to submit to their husband. “New” interpretations are given to passages in order to avoid classic and historical interpretations of these same passages. But what is gained by multiplying interpretations except confusion? There is no need to depart from the classical, historic Christian interpretation of a passage unless there is overwhelming and undeniable evidence that everyone, everywhere, at all times, got it all wrong from the beginning. Yes, that is a logical possibility but unless it can be demonstrated conclusively that this is the case, why spin off multiple interpretations to confuse people. If Christians would simply follow the simple, general rule of precedent in interpreting the Bible much confusion could be avoided. That doesn’t mean that the historic and classical interpretation could never be over-ruled; it just means it shouldn’t be unless some new understanding is clearly and obviously superior based on some new discovery or insight. There are other interpretive rules I could mention also, but we’ll have to leave them for another lesson. The point is, if we simply apply these three very simple rules of biblical interpretation we could come to a greater understanding of the Bible and avoid the most common errors and misunderstandings. Let’s pray we are able, by the grace of God, to understand, believe and live God’s Word – and never fall into error due to wrong interpretation of the Bible.

Title: Hidden Wisdom

Text: Matthew 11:25-26

Date: August 29th, 2009

One of the realities of Christian conversion is that it can’t happen by “talking someone into” becoming a Christian. The most frustrating things of all in the Christian life is trying to explain the gospel to someone who just doesn’t “get it.” You can start with the paradise garden of Eden and explain how God made everything and everyone good at the beginning. But how our original parents Adam and Eve chose to disobey God by eating the forbidden fruit, which resulted in the Fall. You can explain how we all today are born with a sin nature because of the Fall and how we soon too begin to sin on our own also in life, making us both guilty and headed for divine judgment. You can then show how Jesus Christ came to take our place on the cross by paying for our sins, taking our judgment and giving us his righteousness in exchange for our simple trust in him. When we confess and repent of sinfulness and sin, when we turn away from a self-centered life and turn to God in humble faith we are declared forgiven and made righteous through Christ. Apart from Christ we can never justify ourselves before God no matter how hard we try, no matter how holy we live our lives. Only through Christ can we obtain salvation and eternal life. This all makes perfect sense to a convert to Christianity, but it makes no sense to an unbeliever, which is why it’s so frustrating to share the gospel with someone who either doesn’t get it or doesn’t want to get it. It’s as if the truth of God is hidden from them, put out of reach of their comprehension. Well, it really is the case that the truth of God is hidden from them, because the Bible teaches exactly that in Matthew 11:25, “At that time Jesus said, ‘I praise you Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.’”  It seems as if non-Christians can’t understand because they have been kept from understanding by God. It seems as if the gospel is hidden from unbelievers because, well, it has been hidden from them by God. The gospel and all of God’s truths are hidden behind their own pride. We’ve all heard the expression “blinded by pride,” well that’s exactly what this passage is describing in respect to salvation. People could be saved except for their pride. Everyone who is saved is saved through humility. There is a notion that is floating around in Christian circles today that says if only the church would make the gospel and the Bible clearer, then people would understand and believe. Or if only Christians would try harder to make the Bible more relevant and speak in more contemporary terms, then people could be saved. So then, under this kind of thinking, it’s mostly the church’s fault, it’s mostly Christians’ fault that people are not coming to the gospel and being saved. But this is naïve thinking because we can explain the gospel and the Bible with absolute clarity using the language of our times and perfectly relevant, yet people will still not understand or accept it. Why? Because it has been hidden from the proud; only the humble receive it. Let me try to explain this passage by breaking it down into three parts and analyzing each part. I hope by the end we can all appreciate how much a miracle salvation really is, and never take it for granted if we ourselves possess the miracle of salvation.

First, God’s wisdom is hidden from the worldly wise. Matthew 11:25, “At that time Jesus said, ‘I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned.’” What things is Jesus referring? All spiritual truth, everything Jesus teaches, all things the Bible communicates, God’s wisdom. There’s an interesting word used here in this passage. It’s the Greek word ekrupsas from which we get the English word “encryption,” meaning “hidden or made secret.” When someone makes a “cryptic” remark, that means they make some secret reference. I’m familiar with encryption because in the computer world in order to secure a wireless network you need a password in order to plug into an encrypted system. Without a password, the network is hidden and unusable. That’s what this passage is talking about in respect to God’s Word. The message of the gospel and the entire Bible is hidden from unbelievers because they can’t understand it, even though they may be considered wise and knowledgeable by worldly standards. That’s the irony of faith. It doesn’t take intelligence or education or any human ability; it just takes a humble heart and an open mind. It says in the passage that the wise and learned can’t understand because the wisdom of God has been hidden from them. It might have something to do with the fact that, just as the Apostle Paul says, “knowledge puffs up” – or in other words, the accumulation of knowledge often produces pride in an individual and pride actually hides the wisdom of God from an individual. It also has to do with what Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 1:20-21, 25, “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us, who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligence I will frustrate.’ Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world. For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him. God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. . . . For the foolishness of God is wiser than the man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.” And then Paul goes on: “Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of the world and the despised things and the things that are not to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him,” 1 Corinthians 1:26-29. God hides himself and his wisdom so that only the humble may know; the proud are kept from knowing. Jesus said also, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” Matthew 5:3. It all comes back to humility and how the knowledge and wisdom of God comes when we think less of ourselves and more of God. Unfortunately, we live in a prideful world that teaches the very opposite. It teaches us to exalt ourselves under the guise of self-esteem. It teaches us to trust ourselves and doubt God, when in reality we should doubt ourselves and trust God. Until someone learns to trust God more than self, to trust God’s wisdom more than their own so-called wisdom, they’ll never experience the kingdom of God. Let us pray that God produces humility in our unbelieving family, relatives and friends for salvation. And let us thank God that he opened our hearts and minds to his wisdom due to nothing on our own part.

Second, God’s wisdom is revealed to the humble hearted. Matthew 11:25, “At that time Jesus said, ‘I praise you Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.’” Another interesting Greek word in this passage is apekalupsas, which means “revealing” or “unveiling” or “disclosing.” In fact, it’s the same word used as the title of the last book of the Bible – Revelation or the Apocalypse. God reveals himself and his wisdom to the humble of heart. Now the miracle of salvation is shown in the fact that not one of us is naturally humble. Yes, there are people who are more humble than others or less prideful than others. But nobody is humble enough to receive God and his wisdom unless God changes the heart and opens the mind. I mentioned before Matthew 5:3, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” This begins the famous Sermon on the Mount in which Jesus describes the character of a citizen of the kingdom. It isn’t a natural description of the normal state of the human heart. From a very young age we all naturally begin to turn to self and tend to center ourselves on ourselves. We learn early to trust our own judgment and look to ourselves. If we are successful in life – if we can organize our lives to achieve the goal we set for ourselves – we tend to become full of ourselves or prideful. God and God’s wisdom has a hard time making it into our lives while we are in such a state. Those who are “rich in spirit” – meaning, those who are full of self and loaded with self-sufficiency and self-satisfaction, these ones are left outside the kingdom of God because they cannot or will not stoop to enter. Remember what Jesus said about how hard it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, how it’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the kingdom? That’s another way of showing how pride keeps people out of heaven, keeps them from salvation. A rich man’s riches, someone rich in wealth or property or knowledge or education or ability or gifts – anything that produces pride – keeps one from God and the knowledge and wisdom of God. Doesn’t that explain why less and less Americans are turning and converting to Christianity? America is a great social experiment in raising the standard of living of the masses, raising the per capita wealth, education and other categories. But at the same time it also fills men and women with pride and self-sufficiency. Instead of turning to God for help, they turn to themselves. Instead of prayer, they plan. Instead of reading the Bible for wisdom, they turn to the experts in science and education. Today, there is also a great push to raise the level of self-esteem within individuals in society, but this too can work against faith, because after all, Christianity teaches that we are to get our sufficiency not in self but in God. “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,” not “I can do all things through my own self-sufficiency.” I’m afraid it’s going to take a mighty humbling of our nation in order to see a wide-scale return to faith in revival. I’m afraid that humbling is going to take the form of a great catastrophe either natural or man-made. 9/11 humbled us all – for about 24 hours. But soon afterwards, human pride rose up and the humility of the moment was lost. But we need to pray that God brings humility in our lives and the lives of our people because it’s the only way we can receive God and God’s wisdom, which we so desperately need today.

Third, God’s wisdom is revealed through God’s own choosing. Matthew 11:26, “Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.” I’m also thinking of another verse, Matthew 16:17, where Jesus reacts to Peter who has just confessed him as the Christ, “Blessed are you Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven.” You see when it all comes down to it, we don’t choose to be saved as much as we are chosen to be saved. What I mean is that according to the Bible, it is in the secret councils of the sovereign will of God that our salvation is secure, not only in our own personal choosing. The strange thing about the Bible is that it teaches both the predestination of God and the free choice of man, and it does so often in the same passage! For example, John 1:10-13, describes the appearance of the Messiah Jesus and man’s reaction: “He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God – children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.” So here, in this one example, in this one verse, both freedom of choice and predestination are taught without any contradiction. Now I can’t explain how they can both be true, but the Bible teaches they are both true so we must leave it at that. I mentioned before how it is pride of heart that keeps people from receiving God and his wisdom, but that doesn’t answer the deeper question – why does God humble some hearts while leaving others in their pride? Here is the answer from God’s Word: “Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.” In other words, ultimately it’s God’s choice as to who receives the humble heart and receives the gospel and is saved. Now that should really humble you if you grasp the importance of that truth. Because of the gravity of sin, because of the Fall, because of Original Sin, all men and women are so dead in trespasses and sin that they cannot escape their own self-centered gravitational force. We are all bound to orbit around ourselves, trusting in ourselves, being self-sufficient in one way or another, depending on our own reason and ability to solve our own problems in life. Under this condition we are shut off from God and God’s Word. Unless God breaks the power of sin and selfishness in our life, we won’t turn to him and we won’t be saved. But through no work of our own God did break the power of sin and did turn us from ourselves to himself so that we do trust in Christ, his atoning death on our behalf on the cross, and we do desire to follow God’s will instead of our own. Now that’s a miracle that only God can produce. So if you are a Christian, really saved, you have God and only God to thank. Don’t take credit for it yourself. And if you have lost loved ones, friends and others who are still unbelievers, you need to pray that God opens their hearts and eyes so that they can see, without which they will stay lost in sin. That doesn’t mean we just sit back and pray only for them; we are supposed to try as best we can to explain the gospel to them and encourage them to believe any way we can. But ultimately, God has to move in their hearts and they have to respond in order for them to be saved. And that’s the mystery of salvation.

Title: Tough Talk From Jesus

Text: Matthew 11:20-24

Date: August 23rd, 2009

Today, we come to a passage where we hear some tough talk from Jesus, or it you prefer, tough love from Jesus. In Matthew 11:20-24, in only five verses, Jesus talks about three topics that are hardly ever heard in Christian churches today – repentance, Judgment Day and hell. Now you may hear one of these tough topics talked about on Sunday once in a while in church, but it’s very rare that you’d hear about all three. Today, there seems to be a strange aversion to these tough topics by preachers; they simply don’t talk about them very much. Why is that? Because people have told their pastor they don’t like to hear about such negative things on Sunday morning. Think about it. A family rises early to get ready for church. Then they all pack into the car and make the trip to church. Then they finally take a seat in the church and are ready to be inspired, uplifted, encouraged or in some way lifted up, rather than put down, depressed, discouraged or dealt with negatively. People have communicated in more ways than one that they’d rather hear positive messages of inspiration, rather than a negative message of warning. So pastors, always sensitive to the thoughts and feelings of the people, simply omit or neglect preaching on such negative topics as sin, repentance, judgment or hell. That’s the way the people want it, so that’s the way he does it; everybody is happy. Wrong! Everybody is not happy, because God, who is the most important church member or part of the Divine/human equation which is the church, isn’t pleased when pastor and people omit important aspects of biblical truth. If God communicates his will to people he expects them to listen and receive it, and he definitely doesn’t approve of churches omitting or neglecting some truths because they are too “hard” or “negative” or “difficult” for the sensibilities of modern people. Nevertheless, in most Christian churches today, the so-called hard truths of the Bible are rarely dealt with, and when they are mentioned they are usually watered down or soft-peddled or trimmed or softened so that people don’t get upset, or worse yet, leave the church for good. But the curious thing about all this is that Jesus never worried about offending or alienating people when he spoke or taught. He was more concerned about getting out the truth in order that people might be saved and enter into the kingdom of God. We have a perfect example of this in Matthew 11:20-24, where, like I said before, Jesus talks about almost all the modern day church taboo subjects of repentance, judgment and hell. He didn’t seem too overly concerned about offending or alienating his audience as he warned them of the consequences of sinful disobedience. Maybe we should follow the example of Jesus in our churches today and present the plain truth no matter who might take offense. After all, in the end, isn’t God the one we should most fear offending and not so much our fellow human beings? With that as an introduction, let’s listen to some tough talk from Jesus concerning repentance, judgment and hell. Matthew 11:20-24 (read).

First, God has a requirement of repentance. Matthew 11:20-21, “Then Jesus began to denounce the cities in which most of his miracles had been performed, because they did not repent. ‘Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.’” The populations of these small cities either rejected the teachings of Jesus or showed indifference to the teachings, but either way it was counted as unbelief. So then what specific sin was Jesus denouncing these people for failing to repent? Like I talked about last week, stubborn unbelief – that was the primary sin they were guilty of. But of course, from that root sin of unbelief came the continuation of their many and diverse sins; they were also being called to repent of their specific sins as well. We need churches today to do what Jesus did – call people to repent of sin, all sin, every sin. Yet today in churches from pastors in the pulpit we rarely hear calls to repent, because after all, won’t that offend people? Think about it. What is repentance? In the original Greek language of the New Testament, the word for repentance is a compound word, meaning it comes from two other words, meta-noia, or change mind. But it not only means to change one’s mind, it also means to change one’s life. In respect to sin, it means to give up sin. In respect to unbelief, it means to change to belief. Jesus was literally calling people to stop sinning and turn to him in faith. Now why is that such a controversial message to preach in churches today? Because it’s telling people what to do, it’s also judging people as guilty of sin and in need of reform. And as we all know in modern America today, free people don’t like to be told that they are wrong or that they need to change or told what to do. Today, people react with their pride when called to repent or change. But doesn’t that just underscore the need more urgently that they do in fact need to repent? If we are so proud that we can’t be taught what is right and called to change from doing wrong, then we simply reveal the sin of pride – and we need to especially repent of that! But people today want to be free, free from being judged by anyone — even God or God’s Word. Freedom has been so distorted today that is has come to mean “freedom from accountability,” or “freedom to do whatever I want and be left alone doing it.” Now they weren’t as sensitive as we are today, but those ancient people were also proud and I’m sure they didn’t like being told to change their ways either. But Jesus went ahead doing it, and so did the disciples and those who followed them, and so have all faithful church leaders and faithful churches down through the ages. We can’t stop teaching and preaching the Word of God because people will be offended by it. So what about you? Are there sins in your life you need to stop doing? If so, repent, change, give them up! You may not like to hear that, I may not like to hear it either, but it’s a fact. We all need to repent of our sins, and we’d better take it seriously because Jesus and the Apostles took it seriously. Yes, repentance is tough talk, it’s not easy to hear, it’s hard to receive. But let’s just get over that it’s hard and do it! 

Second, God has a day of Judgment coming. Matthew 11:22, “But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the Day of Judgment than for you.” Now if calling people to repentance isn’t hard enough, things just got even harder when Jesus talks about the Day of Judgment. This is another topic that people have communicated to their pastor that they don’t want to hear about — Judgment Day. Now the Jews at the time of Christ all had a pretty clear idea about the judgment to come at the end of time. In fact, most Jews believed in divine judgment, not just at the end time, but also in history. For example, there is Sodom, mentioned later in the verse. Jews understood that it was destroyed by God’s judgment because of its sins. But Jews also understood that there was coming a final Judgment Day when God judged the good and the bad. Now the difference between the ancient people here and the people of today is that the ancients believed in God and God’s judgment but people today, while professing a belief in God don’t really believe there is a day in the future where their sins will be judged – or if they do believe it, they optimistically believe they will pass the judgment with approval, because after all, most people today don’t believe they are bad. This is one of the most striking differences between our time and the ancient times: today we are overly optimistic about ourselves, especially here in America, while the ancients were more realistic about themselves, their faults, and God. Remember how when John the Baptist started preaching his message of repentance how the Jews all flocked to repent and be baptized? That’s acknowledgment of sin, that’s humility, that’s realism, because it’s true. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” and “There is none that is righteous, no not one.” But today, because we’ve turned to psychology instead of biblical morality, we see ourselves as victims rather than guilty. We look for wholeness rather than holiness. We only judge ourselves by ourselves, instead of comparing ourselves to God’s holy standards. The only really bad people are the Hitler types. Only the really bad people deserve judgment, but not the rest of us – that’s what we think today. But it’s totally wrong. According to God’s Word we all deserve God’s judgment and we will all face it too unless we repent. Unless we confess our sins (not just flaws, faults, failures, mistakes) and repent, or turn away from them, we will face the judgment of God and face his condemnation. Now that’s a hard message today, especially in our feel-good, therapeutic, psychology-saturated society. You will not hear that message if you go to 99.99% of counselors today. You’ll hear a very accepting, easy, affirming, message that separates you from your morality. You won’t be called to repent. But repentance is exactly what God is calling us to do, as we see here through the words of Jesus. The people of these small cities didn’t repent of unbelief and sin, they kept right on with business as usual in life. But they failed to realize that Judgment Day is coming and unless they turn around God’ll judge them. I hope you’ve repented of your unbelief and sin. I hope you’ve trusted in Jesus and his atoning death on the cross for forgiveness of sins. I hope you have the righteousness of Christ by faith. Because if you haven’t repented and if you haven’t trusted Christ, you will face God in judgment and you’ll not pass the judgment either. Don’t take it for granted. Make sure of it today.

Third, God has a place of damnation in hell. Matthew 11:23-24, “And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted up to the skies? No, you will go down to the depths. If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day. But I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the Day of Judgment than for you.” Now if repentance and Judgment Day weren’t bad enough, Jesus completes the trifecta by adding the damnation of hell to his preaching points. He’s definitely not seeker sensitive with his messages, which should cause us to wonder why churches are scrambling to be seeker sensitive if Jesus himself wasn’t? Are we really advancing the kingdom of God by hiding from people the full Word of God? Now I would like to mention the fact that the word here translated “the depths” in the NIV Bible is actually the Greek word Hades – which can sometimes be translated “the grave” or sometimes translated “hell.” Which is it here? Well, that all depends on whether you think Jesus is talking about temporal or eternal punishment? Is the Judgment Day some natural or catastrophic disaster that will come upon the cities and bury them to the ground like Sodom? Or is Jesus talking about the souls of the people of these cities? Well, it’s a little bit of both probably, because we know from history, especially biblical history, that God does in fact judge cities and their populations with disaster. He judged the Jews in Jerusalem for their sins by allowing them to go into exile and their city destroyed. Now is Jesus only talking about these historical, temporal judgments? I don’t think so because Jesus was much more concerned about the spiritual condition of the soul than the well being of earthly cities. He was using these cases of judgment and destruction as illustrations as to what can happen when people fail to repent of sin and face the wrath of God the Father. But the point of him using these examples was to call the people to repent of their sins and avoid Judgment Day and eternal damnation. But today, just like Judgment Day, most people are prone to disbelieve in hell or eternal punishment or damnation. Why? Because it’s such a terrible idea, it doesn’t feel right, it’s not a positive idea – and in our therapeutic age most people feel that holding to such ideas are unhealthy mentally. But what a flimsy basis for belief, what a lousy test for truth – it doesn’t feel right. People today really have a high opinion of their own gut instincts and intuition. Again, here’s where the ancient people show a lot more maturity and wisdom than we do in our so-called educated age. They had the fear of God in them and they believed in judgment and hell. They all may not have understood what the Bible teaches but they had a natural understanding of it and a healthy fear of it. Today, in our arrogance, we think we can write things off because we don’t like the idea of it. How arrogant! It’s easy to see why pastors don’t teach much about hell, because people don’t like to think about it. But again, we’ve got to follow Jesus and not the collective wisdom (or foolishness) of people today. In fact, to counteract the doubt and denial about hell, we should teach about it more often in order to balance out the equation. That’s going to call for some pastors with very thick skin.

I like to think of hard or difficult topics found in the Bible as bad tasting medicine. I have to thank God that I’ve lived a pretty healthy life and I haven’t had to take a lot of medicine, especially bad tasting medicine. But I have had to use some pretty bad tasting mouthwash because I was raised on Listerine and I still use it. I’m talking about the original formula. Just as it’s always been, it’s pretty bad tasting stuff, it burns, it feels really bad in my mouth, but it works, so I keep using it. It kills the germs, it eliminates bad breath, it leaves my mouth feeling fresh. In other words, it does its job. Well, I like to think of the hard truths found in the Bible, truths like repentance, God’s Judgment Day, eternal punishment or hell, for example, as the bad tasting medicine that we all need even though we hate to use it. Now the absolutely worse thing we can do is stop taking the medicine because then we can’t get the positive effects of its treatment. That’s what a lot of churches are doing today and I’m afraid that it’s most churches sadly today that are doing it. They are omitting or neglecting or down playing or watering down or trimming or editing out these hard truths because nobody likes to hear them. In all honesty, who really enjoys hearing about eternal damnation? If you were someone who really enjoyed thinking about souls perishing in eternity forever, if you really liked that topic, you’d have to be some kind of masochist, I think that’s the word they use, someone with a tortured mentality. But we do have to teach and preach about hell even though we don’t like to hear about it, because God wants us to be reminded of it whether we like it or not. Like the awful tasting medicine, it’s good for us. The same with Judgment Day. Who likes to think about having our sins exposed and judged by the perfect and just God? Now a true believer, one who has confessed their sins and repented of their sins and placed total trust in Christ for forgiveness, that person won’t face the general judgment of the unbeliever. That’s a relief. But we need to continue to teach about it because there are plenty of people, even people in churches, who really aren’t saved yet. There are plenty of people who think they are saved, but really aren’t. We need to let the tough talk of Jesus warn them that this is serious stuff. Another temptation for churches today is to get too casual and loose and almost flippant on Sunday morning during the church service. The idea is that most people don’t like to be intimidated, so we need to make sure church isn’t too serious that it might turn people off with its intensity. Well, Jesus didn’t seem to follow that rule of church growth either. He talked about all kinds of things including “heavy” things that could intimidate people. No. We need to simply teach and preach the truth and not worry too much about how it will turn people “on” or “off.” That’s up to God to control that. Our assignment is to faithfully present God’s Word and it is that we should focus on. Everything else will take care of itself.

Title: Restoring a Great Man’s Reputation

Text: Matthew 11:7-19

Date: August 16th, 2009

If you remember last week I talked about John the Baptist and his doubts or questions whether Jesus really was the long-awaited Messiah. I shared how when I first encountered the account of John the Baptist doubting Jesus or questioning his identity as Messiah, I was a little disappointed. Why couldn’t this great prophet of God clearly see this spiritual truth, like the Apostle Peter did, for example in his statement to Jesus, “You are the Christ, the Son of Living God,” Matthew 16:16. After all, wasn’t it John the Baptist who first introduced Jesus as the Messiah to the people of Israel and baptized him? Hadn’t he seen the sign from God of the dove descending upon Jesus indicating that he was indeed the Christ? And didn’t he point out Jesus as the Messiah to his disciples? So why now was he doubting all of this and needing further assurances and confirmation? But then I shared how John the Baptist had been thrown into prison by Herod and was facing execution for confronting the king of his sin of adultery. John must have felt alone and abandoned and discouraged. But the big problem John had was that Jesus wasn’t acting fully like the Messiah he and all of the Jews were expecting. In all the miracles of Jesus, he hadn’t performed the most important miracle as far as the Jews were concerned – liberating God’s Chosen People from the pagan Roman oppressors. Isn’t that what the Messiah is supposed to do? Wasn’t that the hope of Israel? Wasn’t that part of the prayer for the coming of the Messiah in the first place? But Jesus wasn’t fulfilling that part — at least not yet. John and the Jews were counting on the Messiah coming and doing his full work in their lifetime, but what they didn’t count on was the Messiah accomplishing his work in two stages. The first coming was for the purpose of dealing with the real problem of all men and women, both Jews and Gentiles, and that was the problem of sin. Jesus came to make atonement for sin, according to the prophecy found in Isaiah 53, the suffering servant. The second coming of Jesus would accomplish the liberation of God’s people and judgment upon earth of their enemies. But the Jews weren’t looking for the Messiah to work in two stages, and neither was John. That’s why the Baptist was having his second thoughts and doubts about Jesus. Jesus reassured John that yes indeed he was in fact the Messiah by pointing out the many supernatural signs and wonders he performed which had been prophesied in the Old Testament the true Messiah would do. But now in the passage for today, Matthew 11:7-19, Jesus attempts to restore the reputation of John the Baptist as a great man even though he questioned and doubted. We are not to think any less of John the Baptist because of his questions concerning the identity of Jesus as Messiah. What Jesus says next about John increases our respect for him, not diminishes it. Matthew 11:7-19 (read). Jesus’ attitude towards doubt is also revealing. It shows that from God’s standpoint, doubting isn’t the worst thing one can do, stubborn unbelief is. That should give us comfort today, especially in our skeptical and doubting age. Better to deal with doubters than outright unbelievers. Better to work through our own doubts than to fake belief yet really be unbelievers. Doubting can actually be the prelude to greater faith – if we process out doubts in a godly way. Let’s look at what Jesus says about John and see what we can learn.

First, John was a great man sent to do a great work. Matthew 11:7-10, “As John’s disciples were leaving, Jesus began to speak to the crowd about John: ‘what did you go out into the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind? If not, what did you go out to see? A man dressed in fine clothes? No, those who wear fine clothes are in kings’ palaces. Then what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written: I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you.’” So in order to restore the reputation of a great man, a great prophet, Jesus begins to reveal to the people just who this man John really is. No doubt many or most of the people listening to Jesus had also followed John the Baptist down to the muddy waters of the Jordan River to be baptized unto repentance of sins. We know that a great many of them would have followed John because the accounts of John’s baptisms say, “all of Jerusalem came down to be baptized.” So John had definitely left his spiritual mark on many or even most of the Jews of that day. In fact, he had probably pointed many or most of the people to Jesus as the Messiah by identifying him as such down by the river. But now he had his doubts and the people were probably a little confused and just as I was, a little disappointed in John. So Jesus wants to restore John’s reputation as a man of God and reveal a little more about him than was already known, information that would give everyone a bigger appreciation for him. Jesus tells the people that John was in fact more than just a prophet; he was the prophet sent to reveal the coming of the Messiah. Now other Old Testament prophets had been sent by God to prophesy concerning the coming of the Messiah, but for them, that was future prophecy. For example, the prophet Malachi prophesied, “See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple: the messenger, of the covenant who you desire, will come, says the Lord Almighty,” Malachi 3:1. And there were other such prophets who prophesied about the coming of the Messiah. But with John the Baptist, not only did he prophesy the coming of the Messiah, but he himself was prophesied by the prophets too. For example, in the Malachi prophecy I just cited, it speaks of a messenger who will prepare the way of the Lord. That’s John the Baptist! We see here how great John was. Not only was he prophesying but he had been prophesied about as well by other prophets. He was the forerunner of the Messiah who would be visible at his appearing. His role was to spiritually prepare the people for the Messiah through repentance and baptism. So there is no question that John the Baptist is special. Jesus didn’t want anyone walking away thinking any less of John the Baptist just because he entertained some doubts and asked questions concerning the identity of Messiah. It’s ok to doubt, even the great men of faith have done it, just as long as you keep on asking questions. God rewards those who continually ask questions and grow in knowledge and faith. But beware of the day when you stop asking questions or settle into a perpetual state of doubt, or worse, unbelief. But there’s more.

Second, John was the greatest man sent to do the greatest work. Matthew 11:11-15, “’I tell you the truth: Among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it. For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John. And if you are willing to accept it, he is the Elijah who was to come. He who has ears, let him hear.’” Jesus goes one further in promoting John’s reputation and status – not only was John a great man, he was the greatest of all the Old Testament figures. Under the Old Covenant system, John was the epitome of a godly man. Think about it. John was marked out from birth. Zechariah, his father, had an angelic vision which said, “Do not be afraid Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth. Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God. And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the father to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous – to make ready a people prepared for the Lord,” Luke 1:13-17. When John matured and began his public ministry it was thought that he might even be the Messiah himself – so clearly did God speak through this prophet. We must also remember that before John the prophetic voice of God in Israel had been silent for at least 400 years, so when John appeared on the scene, people recognized the voice of God in his words. According to Jesus, John was the greatest Old Testament biblical figure ever, or in other words, he fulfilled the Old Testament ideal of a godly man, a righteous man. I believe the Christian church has traditionally overlooked John the Baptist as a hero and role model. It’s easy to do so because he was such a humble man and never drew attention to himself, but always to Jesus the Messiah. We need to explore and unpack everything about John the Baptist to fully understand what Jesus was saying when he claimed John was the greatest Old Testament saint, but we don’t have time for that today. Nevertheless, as great as John was, according to Jesus, the least New Covenant saint is greater. Now what can that mean? It means, under the Old Testament covenant the most godly person, one who kept the law best both externally and internally even – according to Jesus that was John the Baptist; but even the greatest Old Testament saint is least godly under the New Covenant arrangement. How so? Because it’s the righteousness of Christ that makes us godly under the New as opposed to our own best efforts under the Old. John was the best of the best under the Old covenant, but he’s nothing, he’s no saint even compared with Christ Jesus. And when we repent of sin and believe upon the Lord Jesus for salvation, our sins are placed on Christ and Christ’s righteousness is placed on us in a great exchange. That makes us holier than any Old Testament saint, working under his or her own holiness or godliness. We are made saints through Christ, not by our own personal effort at holiness. Are you today a New Testament saint? That’s right, are you a saint today? If you’ve exchanged your sins for Christ’s righteousness you are, if you haven’t you are still under the Old Covenant; you don’t yet understand the gospel. Why not make the great exchange today? One more thing.

Third, doubts are acceptable, stubborn unbelief is not. Matthew 11:16-19, “To what can we compare this generation? They are like children sitting in the market places and calling out to others: ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge and you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her actions.” We’ve already seen that Jesus can deal with doubters and those who have questions, but what we also see here is that he doesn’t have patience with those who refuse to believe, those who stubbornly cling to unbelief no matter what. What I’ve been teaching last week and now this week is that God wants us all to have faith, to believe strongly and obey with conviction, faith is better than doubt, but if we do have questions, if we do have doubts, he wants us to ask our questions and seek out answers; he’ll honor that process. As long as we are actively seeking out answers so that we might believe and obey with more conviction, God will assist us, but we are not to simply resign ourselves in doubt because that will eventually turn into outright unbelief if we stay there too long. Sadly, there is a growing movement within Protestant Evangelicalism called the Emerging Church that seems to linger and lounge around in doubt. Because the general culture is skeptical of all absolute truth, because the so-called post-modern culture is resigned to moral relativism, this segment of evangelicalism has decided that in order to relate with and reach post-moderns it too must assume a posture of doubt and skepticism towards truth, even biblical Christian truth. For example, some of the Emerging Church spokesmen say things like, “Jesus never really taught on the rightness or wrong of homosexuality, and the rest of the Bible is pretty unclear about the whole topic, so it’s hard to say absolutely how we should think about it, so we’d better just leave it open ended and not be too dogmatic one way or another. Maybe gay marriage is ok? Maybe openly gay ordained ministers are acceptable?” This is not the legitimate questioning and doubting that Jesus tolerated in his ministry, but instead, this is really unbelief hiding behind questions. The Bible is very clear for those who are seeking answers to questions of faith. For example, it’s very clear how God views homosexuality; it’s sin, it’s wrong. But stubborn unbelief, like the Pharisees displayed, is not acceptable. There is just no convincing stubborn unbelief. Jesus uses the illustration of children trying to please an audience – they tried to play a joyful song on the flute but nobody danced, then they tried to play a sad song but nobody mourned. There was just no pleasing the crowd. John the Baptist came emphasizing the Law of God, repentance and reformation of life – and the Pharisees didn’t follow that. Then Jesus came along and emphasized grace, love and joy – and the Pharisees in stubborn unbelief didn’t follow that either. They just weren’t about to believe anything other than what they had already believed; they weren’t about to change. That’s stubborn unbelief.

Now when we look out at society today what do we see in respect to spiritual openness? On the surface we see a lot of people claiming to be seekers of truth. There are now thousands and thousands of churches designed to attract so-called spiritual seekers. If you look at the numbers of people who attend church and who claim to be Christians you’d think our nation was undergoing spiritual revival or something close to it, based on the apparent spiritual movement among people in culture today. But if you look below the surface what you find is that there is a lot of stubborn unbelief in society today. Oprah Winfrey has a large spiritual network which teaches people New Age spirituality, but if you try to teach these same people biblical truths, most of them will reject it outright. Why? Because it involves God’s absolute truths and God’s authority and God’s accountability. People today mostly want to be spiritual but also want to be in charge of their own spiritual lives and destiny. They aren’t interested in submitting to God or repenting of their sins or trusting in Jesus Christ alone for salvation; they’d rather trust in themselves and find their own way of salvation using bits and pieces from all religions and philosophies. That’s a form of stubborn unbelief also. But God does honor and reward sincere spiritual seekers after truth. That’s why we shouldn’t judge people who have questions about God or question the Bible or have doubts about the Christian faith. We should encourage them to ask their questions and seek out answers. I’ve found in my own life that the first place I want to go when I find myself doubting or entertaining serious questions about Christianity is to some good, solid conservative Christian resource. When I attended Wheaton College I took advantage of being in a solidly conservative Christian environment and asked lots of questions and found lots of answers. This really helped me and has probably saved me from spending all kinds of time wasting away in doubt about my faith. I’ve also been able to get a hold of good, solid Christian books that deal with the questions and doubts I’ve had. That’s very important also. But the point is that it takes some time and it takes some effort to work through doubts and questions and get helpful answers. It requires hitting the books and doing your homework and digging to get answers that help. The Devil would have us put off doing the homework in dealing with doubts. He’d rather have us deny our doubts or perpetually come up with excuses why we can’t seek out answers because he knows that the longer we dwell in doubt the better the chances we’ll end up in unbelief. So it is to his advantage to get us distracted from any serious study. But we should never let that happen. Perhaps the best resource in dealing with doubts is a good, solid conservative Christian church – one that respects the Bible and teaches from it and encourages obedience to it. Having teaching and preaching that covers the major topics of the Christian faith and explains them thoroughly is important. Not everyone can go to Bible College and Seminary, but everyone can attend a good Christian church, or at least the best church around. There we can also meet other Christians who have or are dealing with the same questions we are, and can help us. The lesson is this: even great saints, like John the Baptist, have doubts occasionally, but the greats also work through their doubts to solid faith by asking questions and then getting answers that help them obtain full conviction of faith. Let’s make that our pattern too.